Internet Censorship in Kazakhstan



According to Freedom House's annual report on the state of Internet freedom, in 2019 the situation in the country worsened: at the end of the year, Kazakhstan dropped from 46th place to 50th, sitting between Thailand and Russia. Before us in this ranking are Belarus (48th place), Azerbaijan (45th place), and Kyrgyzstan (25th place).


The annual ranking evaluates the degree of freedom of print, broadcast, and online media according to the following indicators: 

  • presence of barriers to Internet access (infrastructural and economic barriers to access, legal control and control of the ownership of Internet providers, as well as the independence of regulatory bodies; Kazakhstan scored 10 points out of 25 possible);
  • content restrictions (site and content blocking, censorship; Kazakhstan scores 11 out of 35 possible);
  • violation of user rights (surveillance of online activities, privacy, and consequences for online performances; Kazakhstan scored 11 points out of 40 possible).

According to the results of the rating, Freedom House divides the world into countries with “free”, “partially free” and “not free” Internet. Kazakhstan, with only 32 points out of 100, falls into the latter category.


Experts attribute the deterioration in the level of Internet freedom primarily to the ongoing blocking of independent sites and local restrictions on access to the Internet during rallies. In addition, the authorities use social networks to manipulate public consciousness and control their citizens, resort to the help of bots, and continue prosecutions for statements made online. This is not the only thing that “pleased” users with 2019: for the first time in the history of the country’s digitalization, a “shutdown” (a cyberattack on the country) was observed in May.

As it became known on January 12, 2022, after the start of protests in the country, the authorities of Kazakhstan tried to pointwise block traffic on the Internet using DPI (Deep Packet Inspection) equipment, but they failed. According to Forbes, citing its sources, because of this, the authorities had to turn off access to the Network "almost manually."


According to the interlocutor of the publication, close to one of the Russian telecom operators, Kazakhtelecom, the largest telecom company in Kazakhstan, purchased DPI systems for its own purposes (for example, to collect analytics and prioritize traffic), and it turned out to be “not sharpened” for blocking.

The State Committee for National Security (UQQ) sent an order to every telecom company to block the traffic transmission channel. After that, the operators turned off the equipment either at the core of the network or by disabling the Internet service itself.

The losses of the Kcell operator due to blocking are estimated at 1 billion tenge. According to the Top10VPN portal, the total damage to the country's economy due to the network shutdown amounted to about $189 million.


DPI technology by January 2022 is used in Russia to filter traffic. As part of the implementation of the law on the "sovereign Internet", telecom operators were obliged to install the appropriate state equipment at traffic exchange points. The scheme assumes that in the event of a threat to the operation of the Russian Internet, Roskomnadzor will be able to take over the centralized management of communication networks and ensure uninterrupted Internet.


On January 7, 2021, President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev announced that, due to the stabilization of the situation, he decided to turn on the Internet in certain regions of the country for certain time intervals. According to him, this will positively affect the lives of citizens.

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