Taqwaa Kazi | Originally Published: 1 November 2026
Image Credit: DigWatch Article on “Data privacy shifts from breaches to authorised surveillance”
The internet was once considered a domain of free speech untouched by government agendas and controlled by the people, but with the rapid evolution of the digital world, its use has expanded from a platform of personal expression to an international tool of control at the government’s will. In “Brazil, Elon Musk and the Misuse of Digital Sovereignty,” Michael Kwet (2024) talks about the dangerous line between protection and censorship of speech when it comes to government involvement in the internet, while Julia Ryng et al. (2022) in “Internet Shutdowns: A Human Rights Issue” discuss the correlation between internet shutdowns and human rights. Both articles argue that government over-involvement in digital spaces threatens citizens’ freedom of speech, and this over-involvement has the potential to spiral into a heavily monitored cyberspace. In this article, I outline the strengths and weaknesses of the aforementioned articles. In doing so, I will showcase the threats posed by state censorship of digital media and present solutions that can address these threats.
Government Censorship as a Greater Threat than Social Media’s Data Mining
Michael Kwet’s main argument in his 2024 article, “Brazil, Elon Musk and the Misuse of Digital Sovereignty,” is that while Big Social Media has a concerning amount of power to control information, allowing governments greater access to regulate media networks could lead to censorship that only reflects the government’s political ideologies. The strength of the article lies in its clear identification of how countries can begin state censorship under the guise of protecting their people from being exploited by media companies. Kwet uses the legal battle of the social media app X and the Brazilian Court as an example to warn readers that even emerging democracies like Brazil are susceptible to censorship. It goes on to explain that the Brazilian Supreme Court has been making requests to X to suspend certain accounts that criticize Brazilian politicians, which is a common censorship tactic, as historically, governments have silenced speakers by relying on vague and overbroad laws coupled with arbitrary decisions to create a chilling effect among their people (Callamard 2017, 127). The fact that Brazil, which is not known as an interfering state, has taken such a step highlights that censorship can occur in any form of political system. Additionally, Kwet outlines why state involvement is detrimental to digital spaces, arguing it is an even worse threat to citizens’ data compared to Big Social Media, stating that government control of social media platforms will limit rather than protect freedom of expression, uphold democracy, or ensure fair politics (Kwet 2024).
That said, a critical weakness of Kwet’s article is that its solutions do not take into account that digital surveillance has already become deeply ingrained into society to effectively protect citizen data. From Iranian and Syrian regimes spying on citizens (Xu 2021) to a democracy like India enacting internet shutdowns in Kashmir during conflict (Grover 2025), the 21st century has featured a return in force of censorship (Callamard 2017). Furthermore, Kwet’s solutions are vague, generalized ideas that do little to address current digital surveillance. For example, Kwet suggests that grassroots activists should press for social media decentralization laws along with public subsidies and bans on platform-based advertising, which might have prevented and limited surveillance in the early stages of the internet, but this proposed solution is ineffective in today’s digital environment as it doesn’t acknowledge how deeply intertwined surveillance via social media has become within society. This proposed strategy can be improved by acknowledging existing limits of the law surrounding internet shutdowns and reframing the solutions to restrict further integration of digital surveillance in digital spaces. Practically, this means considering the legal and regulatory frameworks used to facilitate digital censorship that need to be dismantled to give power back to the people and ensure genuine digital sovereignty (De Gregorio 2020; Meserve and Pemstein 2018).
Present-Day Surveillance, Securitisation Theory, and Potential Solutions
Where Kwet fails to consider the current context surrounding the politics of digital platforms, Julia Ryng et al. (2022) explore present-day policies and the current state of surveillance. They also describe how we can implement long-term strategies to minimize future digital surveillance. This article makes a compelling argument about current tactics that work in tandem with digital surveillance to control citizens, stressing that Internet shutdowns are a form of violence that restricts people’s freedoms of expression, association, assembly, and privacy, as it is one of the many ways the digital space is weaponized against citizens. I find this article’s argument convincing because it provides a thorough account of control tactics such as overt blackouts that disrupt communication of potential protests and filtered access to prevent the spread of radical support.
Ryng et al. (2022) also discuss securitisation theory, which is when an issue is presented as an existential threat to a nation’s security that urgently needs to be dealt with, thus justifying shutting down the internet. This discussion links directly to patterns of digital surveillance, which have been identified by many scholars over the past decade. Dictators and governments have used digital surveillance to forestall citizen mobilization by identifying radical opponents and employing less visible, low-intensity repression so citizens are less likely to hide their regime preferences (Xu 2021). When people stop self-censoring, digital surveillance becomes easier for governments.
As solutions to this concern surrounding digital surveillance, Ryng et al. (2022) propose:
- users should pressure multinational companies to cease business with governments, which would weaken state control over virtual spaces; and
- technologies should be innovated such that they can circumvent government-imposed internet shutdowns and bypass censorship tactics (62).
The solutions given by Ryng et al. (2022) offer a realistic approach to protecting digital spaces and freedom of expression online. That said, a key weakness of this article is that it only focuses on two countries, Belarus and Myanmar, both of which have experienced active political conflict for a long time (50). As a result, the article does not consider what state censorship would look like for a country that claims to be democratic. Essentially, the article does not address how censorship can occur in a country that, in theory, protects freedom of speech but censors to destroy dissent before it evolves into protests. Additionally, the article does not consider that certain groups, such as those in rural areas, are more vulnerable to censorship due to their limited access to the internet. Their unstable connectivity to the digital world interferes with their ability to access, participate in, and benefit from the state and “disciplines” marginalized communities from mobilizing against the state (Grover 2025). Thereby, the effectiveness of the solutions proposed by Ryng et al. is limited because they do not account for democratic countries or the potential benefits of state intervention and regulation of digital media.
Conclusion
In summary, Kwet’s identification of the beginning of censorship within countries explains why government involvement in digital spaces is harmful to freedom of speech; however, his argument is weakened by generalized solutions that do not consider current digital surveillance. In contrast, Ryng et al.’s solutions are their strength, as they take into account present and future strategies that can be a workaround to digital surveillance tactics that impact freedom of expression. Where Ryng et al. fall short is in how censorship can look even in democratic countries. In a world where we are increasingly becoming dependent on the Internet, identifying the beginnings of state censorship is vital to protecting the populace’s power and rights. Whether digital surveillance is dressed as a country concerned about security or a billionaire manipulating the apps, it is bound to have an impact on democracy and freedom of speech. These articles both demonstrate that there are many intricacies to preventing government overreach through digital media. The articles also highlight that finding a solution to overreaching digital surveillance may not be a case of one size fits all. Rather, the solution must account for the constantly changing nature of technology, the various internal politics of platforms, and the differing governance structures of states.
Taqwaa Kazi is a second-year student at the University of Toronto, double-majoring in Political Science and Public Health. She is an Editor for the 2026-2027 Commentary Division of The Attaché Journal of International Affairs. Outside of school, she enjoys baking complicated desserts and working on various DIY projects.
References
1. Callamard, Agnes. 2017. “The Control of ‘Invasive’ Ideas in a Digital Age.” Social Research: An International Quarterly 84 (1): 119–45. https://doi.org/10.1353/sor.2017.0009.
2. De Gregorio, Giovanni. 2020. “Internet Shutdowns and the Limits of Law.” International Journal of Communication 14: 4224–43.
3. Grover, Rohan. 2025. “Contingent Connectivity: Internet Shutdowns and the Infrastructural Precarity of Digital Citizenship.” New Media & Society 27 (1): 359–78. https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448231176552.
4. Kwet, Michael. 2024. “How Not to Counter the Political Sway of Elon Musk’s X.” Al Jazeera, November 5. https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/11/5/how-not-to-counter-the-political-sway-of-elon-musks-x.
5. Meserve, Stephen A., and Daniel Pemstein. 2018. “Google Politics: The Political Determinants of Internet Censorship in Democracies.” Political Science Research and Methods 6 (2): 245–63. https://doi.org/10.1017/psrm.2017.1.
6. Ryng, Julia, Guillemette Guicherd, Judy Al Saman, Priyanka Choudhury, and Angharad Kellett. 2022. “Internet Shutdowns: A Human Rights Issue.” The RUSI Journal 167 (4–5): 50–63. https://doi.org/10.1080/03071847.2022.2156234.
7. Xu, Xu. 2021. “To Repress or to Co‐opt? Authoritarian Control in the Age of Digital Surveillance.” American Journal of Political Science 65 (2): 309–25. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12514.
