Social and political progress in the 21st century has been closely tied to the successes and failures of mass mobilizations that effectively utilized the internet during the 2010s yet faced increasing control over traffic online in the aftermath of global uprisings. Several nation-states, threatened by country-wide movements and the 2013 NSA revelations, directed their efforts towards implementing new policies and regulations to control the local Internet. This set a precedent for many others to adopt new methods and metrics of control.
Digital jurisdictions focus on mapping out shared technical methods and legal perspectives for data sovereignty. The project aims to show evolving methods of digital retaliation from respective governments that specifically employ technological tools and regulatory and bureaucratic frameworks.
We conducted research on existing Internet laws and regulatory frameworks to understand how nation-states assert sovereignty over local data traffic that may improve or hinder the freedom of their citizen users and created a network map of affinity in their approaches to issues around digital justice.
We identified the following techniques and legal metrics to measure countries’ sovereignty over local data traffic after a comprehensive analysis of laws, and secondary resources of regulatory frameworks: Use of Malicious Spyware or Surveillance Practices, HTTPS Bans, DNS Ban, ISP Ban, IP Block, DPI Block, Platform Ban, VPN and/or Tor Block, Throttling, Internet Shutdowns, Content Filtering, Removal Request to Foreign Platforms, Content Governance, Data Nationalization, Targeting Digital Dissidents, Data Protection, Fair and Just Data Practices, and Net Neutrality.