The State Inspectorate for control in the sphere of informatization and telecommunications (“Uzkomnazorat”) resorted to the actual blocking of Wechat. The agency itself calls this a restriction of access. Now the Chinese social network will add to the register of violators of the rights of subjects of personal data.
Earlier, ACCA wrote about the notification of Uzkomnazorat in May to Facebook, Google, Mail.ru, Skype, Telegram, Wechat, TikTok, Twitter, Yandex about the need to localize servers. So far, only Yandex Go from this list posts personal data of Uzbek citizens on servers in the country.
If earlier the authorities practiced uncompromising and non-transparent blocking, now the work of social networks is limited on the basis of official documents. In January of this year, the authorities changed the law on personal data, the amendments obliged website owners to store personal data of Uzbek citizens in the country. They came into effect in April. A new procedure for exercising state control over compliance with certain conditions for the processing of personal data by citizens of the Republic of Uzbekistan began to operate.
The State Inspectorate has already restricted access to some social networks since July 2. The time spent on Twitter, TikTok and VK has increased. Users noted interruptions in the connection in the Skype messenger.
The popularity of VPN applications has skyrocketed in Uzbekistan, as evidenced by data from the mobile analytics service App Annie. In the App Store, VPNs took the first two places; they entered the TOP-3 in Google Play. Before social media was restricted, VPN apps weren’t even in the TOP-50. The last time such a massive download of VPN applications was in 2018, when Facebook and YouTube were blocked in the country.
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