[tor-project] OONI Monthly Report: May 2024

[Maria Xynou]

Hello,

This email shares OONI's monthly report for May 2024.

*# OONI Monthly Report: May 2024*

Throughout May 2024, the OONI team’s work can be tracked through the
various OONI GitHub repositories: https://github.com/ooni

Highlights are shared in this report below.

*## Hosted the OONI Partner Gathering 2024 in Malaysia*

On 8th and 9th May 2024, we hosted an in-person OONI Partner Gathering 2024
in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

As part of this 2-day event, we brought our partners (primarily from Asia
and the Middle East) together to exchange skills and knowledge on internet
censorship research. The goal of the event was to strengthen global and
regional collaborations on censorship measurement research and advocacy.

 The OONI Partner Gathering 2024 brought together 45 individuals from 30
countries. Specifically, the participants included OONI partners from
Southeast Asia, South Asia, East Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East (
https://ooni.org/partners), some OONI partners who work internationally, as
well as the whole OONI team. The event was possible thanks to generous
support from the Ford Foundation (https://www.fordfoundation.org/) and
Luminate (https://www.luminategroup.com/).

As part of the OONI Partner Gathering 2024, we had the following objectives:
* Exchange skills, knowledge, and methodologies to empower community
participation in censorship measurement research and advocacy;
* Better understand local challenges and develop strategies for improving
censorship measurement research around the world;
* Better understand partner/community needs;
* Collect community feedback to support the improvement of OONI tools and
methodologies;
* Strengthen partnerships and strategically define goals and priorities on
the study of internet censorship in collaboration with partners.

The ultimate goal of the OONI Partner Gathering 2024 was to strengthen the
OONI partnership network to help ensure that internet censorship is
well-documented and rapidly addressed so that the world’s most at-risk
individuals – human rights defenders, journalists, activists, and
marginalized people in repressive environments — have consistent and open
access to the internet.
The agenda included a mixture of skill-share sessions, presentations,
hands-on exercises, and interactive group discussions. We included a
variety of parallel sessions to accommodate more sessions in the agenda,
and to encourage more active participation in smaller group discussions. To
provide space for discussions on ideas and needs that may emerge during the
event, we also included a slot for “unconference” style sessions.

Overall, the two-day OONI Partner Gathering 2024 event included 25
sessions, 20 of which were part of the official agenda, while 5 were
proposed and facilitated by participants as part of the “unconference”
session slots. The sessions were facilitated by both the OONI team and our
partners. Notably, 9 sessions (from the official agenda) were facilitated
by 11 of our partners, who provided amazing presentations sharing their
work! We thank all those who facilitated sessions and participated in
note-taking, helping to ensure a dynamic, inclusive, interesting, and
well-documented event.

To help ensure a safe, inclusive, and welcoming environment for all
participants of the OONI Partner Gathering 2024, we shared the event’s Code
of Conduct (CoC) with all participants prior to the event, and we set up an
Incident Response Committee (composed of two partners and two OONI team
members). No CoC violations were reported.

The main outcomes of the OONI Partner Gathering 2024 include:

* *Deeper understanding of regional challenges and partner needs. *Throughout
the sessions of the OONI Partner Gathering, we gained deeper insight into
the challenges experienced by our partners. Specifically, we mapped out
current and emerging digital rights threats, the challenges that our
partners experience in measuring internet censorship in their countries and
regions, and we gained a deeper understanding of our partners’ needs. This
insight will help with informing the improvement of OONI tools, as well as
with informing opportunities for collaboration, shared strategies, and
future goals.
* *Collection of partner feedback.* OONI tools and methods have always been
informed by community feedback. Based on the documentation of partner
feedback, we will improve upon our tools, methodologies, and dataset to
better meet the needs of our community. We may also create new tools based
on partner feedback to support censorship measurement efforts.
* *Increased partner ability to lead censorship measurement efforts in
their countries/regions. *Through skillshares and knowledge-shares at the
event, our partners gained an improved understanding of how to use OONI
tools and data. This will support their community engagement activities,
expanding OONI censorship measurement coverage and the documentation of
censorship events. As an outcome of their participation at the OONI Partner
Gathering 2024, we expect to see our partners make greater use of OONI
tools and data in support of their research and advocacy efforts.
* *Strengthened partnerships.* This was the first time that we met many of
our partners in person, as the COVID-19 pandemic over the last years had
reduced this opportunity. As a result of sharing knowledge, skills, and
meals together, we now have stronger partnerships. The challenges and needs
(as identified through sessions facilitated at the OONI Partner Gathering)
will inform (many of) the goals and priorities of OONI partnerships moving
forward.
* *New partnerships.* We strategically invited a few (regional)
organizations to the OONI Partner Gathering with whom we hadn’t established
a partnership (yet), but with whom we hoped to formalize a partnership
given our mission alignment and the impact of their work. One of these
organizations was Indonesia’s SAFEnet (who are known for having
successfully litigated and advocated against the 2019 Internet shutdown in
Indonesia), with whom we established a partnership in July 2024. We are
also currently in the process of discussing and formalizing partnerships
with prominent digital rights organizations in Central Asia. Moreover, our
partners had the opportunity to learn from each other during the event and
to explore opportunities for new collaborations between them.

As a result of the above, we expect to see increased use of OONI tools and
data in support of research and advocacy efforts aimed at monitoring and
responding to censorship events in Asia and the Middle East over the next
few years.

At the Closing Ceremony of the event, all participants received a
certificate for their participation at the OONI Partner Gathering 2024.
Following the OONI Partner Gathering 2024, we shared a survey with all
participants to collect their feedback on the event and to learn how we can
improve future events. As part of this survey, we collected very positive
feedback and participants provided a very positive evaluation of the event.

Further details are available through our OONI Partner Gathering 2024
Report: https://ooni.org/post/2024-ooni-partner-gathering-report/

We thank all participants who took time out of their busy schedules to fly
across the world to join us in Kuala Lumpur for the OONI Partner Gathering
2024. Thanks to their invaluable feedback and participation, they made the
event an unforgettable experience for us all.

We also thank the Ford Foundation and Luminate for supporting the OONI
Partner Gathering 2024, believing in our mission, and making this event
possible!

*## OONI Team Meeting 2024 in Malaysia*

Following the OONI Partner Gathering 2024 (which brought together the whole
OONI team), we hosted an OONI Team Meeting Day on 10th May 2024 in Kuala
Lumpur, Malaysia.

As part of this meeting, we discussed OONI’s strategy, roles and
responsibilities within the team, and we improved upon our roadmaps.

Specifically, the OONI Team Meeting Day included the following sessions:
* OONI Strategy
* Roles, responsibilities, and decision making within the OONI team (Part 1)
* Roles, responsibilities, and decision making within the OONI team (Part 2)
* Presenting Thematic Censorship Findings on OONI Explorer and Revamping
the OONI Explorer Navigation
* VPN measurement update from OTF Information Controls Fellow
* Roadmap updates (Part 1)
* Roadmap updates (Part 2)

As an outcome, we improved our roadmaps, we had important strategic
discussions in person, and we discussed the next steps for some of our core
projects.

*## Published new report on the OONI Censorship Findings page*

In May 2024, we published a report documenting the blocking of Grindr in
Malaysia: https://explorer.ooni.org/findings/44213966401

OONI data suggests that Malaysia started blocking access to Grindr – the
world’s largest social networking app for gay, bi, trans, and queer people
– on 17th April 2024. Recent OONI data suggests that the block remains
ongoing.

*## Research collaborations with partners on upcoming reports*

We continued to coordinate with our partners on research efforts required
for upcoming research reports. Specifically, we coordinated with our
partners on extensive updates to the Citizen Lab test lists for Bangladesh
and Iran.

In May 2024, the updates for the test lists of Bangladesh and Iran were
finalized. Specifically:
* Digitally Right updated the test list for Bangladesh:
https://github.com/citizenlab/test-lists/pull/1733
* Miaan Group contributed more updates to the test list for Iran:
https://github.com/citizenlab/test-lists/pull/1726

*## OONI Probe Mobile*

We released News Media Scan v3.8.7:
https://github.com/ooni/probe-android/pull/549

Notably, this release includes localization support for French, German,
Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Turkish.

*## OONI Probe Desktop*

In May 2024, we released OONI Probe Desktop 3.9.6:
https://github.com/ooni/probe-desktop/releases/tag/v3.9.6

The latest version makes use of OONI Probe CLI v.3.22.0.

*## OONI Probe CLI*

In May 2024, we released OONI Probe CLI 3.22:
https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/releases/tag/v3.22.0

We documented the interaction between OONI Probe and the “probe services”
(i.e., the OONI backend APIs providing services to OONI Probe). As part of
this work, we also seized the opportunity to simplify and rationalize the
code: https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/2700

We refactored the algorithm used by OONI Probe to communicate with possibly
blocked probe services to prioritize the DNS results over the bridge
strategy and previous knowledge about existing working strategies:
https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/2704

*## OONI Run*

Throughout May 2024, we focused on delivering OONI Run v2 support for the
Deutsche Welle News Media Scan application (
https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/2733). Adding this functionality to
their application will enable Deutsche Welle to independently maintain and
update lists of URLs they wish to test. We focused on adding the specific
functionality they required to do so, as well as on bug fixing and testing.

With regards to the OONI Run v2 implementation in OONI Probe Mobile, we
continued our efforts to test and fix bugs. In May 2024, we fixed the
following bugs: https://github.com/ooni/run/issues/161,
https://github.com/ooni/run/issues/165,
https://github.com/ooni/run/issues/147,
https://github.com/ooni/run/issues/151

*## OONI Explorer*

In May 2024, we continued our efforts to update our design system to
TailWindCSS (https://github.com/ooni/design-system/issues/174) by updating
components to use the new framework (
https://github.com/ooni/design-system/pull/170). We also continued our
efforts to ensure that the OONI Explorer Country pages matched recently
re-designed components (https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/915,
https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/914).

Based on community feedback collected as part of our previous user research
studies, we concluded that the new thematic censorship findings pages on
OONI Explorer will focus on the following themes:
* News Media: https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/940
* Social Media: https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/939
* Circumvention: https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/941

Community feedback also informed the ways through which information can be
presented on each of these thematic pages, as well as which information to
prioritize.

While in Kuala Lumpur, we held a session during the OONI Team Day (10th May
2024) to further discuss our plans for both our projects on “Presenting
Thematic Censorship Findings on OONI Explorer” and “Revamping the OONI
Explorer Navigation”. We reviewed the mockups that had been made and we
discussed the next steps.

We have created the following issues to track this work:
https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/938
https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/940
https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/941
https://github.com/ooni/explorer/issues/939

We also added simple event tracking (
https://github.com/ooni/explorer/pull/942) to the existing navigation bar
so that we can better understand the top-visited pages on OONI Explorer. We
will compare the data to the new navigation bar, once it is launched.

*## General backend work*

In May 2024, we:
*  Worked on porting the oonifindings API over to our new API pattern (
https://github.com/ooni/backend/issues/814);
* Worked on refactoring the oonimeasurements service (
https://github.com/ooni/backend/pull/851);
* Tried out a few devops PoCs to improve our devops processes (
https://github.com/ooni/devops/pull/59).

*## Automating censorship detection and characterization based on OONI
measurements*

To help boost the performance of the new data processing pipeline, we
started working on optimizing the performance of table writers and
refactoring the table model: https://github.com/ooni/data/pull/72

Notably, we had the opportunity to present and share our new data analysis
methods (for automating the detection and characterization of censorship)
with our global network of partners and with experts from the internet
measurement community.

On 8th and 9th May 2024, we hosted the OONI Partner Gathering: a 2-day
event in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, which brought OONI partners together to
exchange skills and knowledge on internet censorship research and advocacy.
During this event, we facilitated a session (“OONI data analysis deep
dive”), as part of which we presented the OONI pipeline v5 (
https://github.com/ooni/data) and shared details of our methodological
improvements for automating the detection and characterization of internet
censorship based on OONI data. This enabled us to collect feedback from our
partner network and to discuss how this could be useful to research and
advocacy groups in highly censored environments (once the new pipeline is
shipped into production).



*## Community use of OONI data### Access Now’s #KeepItOn 2023 Report*

In May 2024, Access Now published their annual 2023 #KeepItOn Report on
Internet shutdowns around the world, which is available here:
https://www.accessnow.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/2023-KIO-Report.pdf

Many OONI reports from our Censorship Findings platform (
https://explorer.ooni.org/findings), as well as OONI research reports (
https://ooni.org/reports/) and OONI Explorer measurements (
https://explorer.ooni.org/) were cited quite extensively as part of Access
Now’s (annual) #KeepItOn Report on Internet shutdowns in 2023.



*## Community activities### iMAP Regional Partners Meeting in Malaysia*

On 6th and 7th May 2024 (prior to the OONI Partner Gathering 2024), OONI’s
Maria, Arturo, and Elizaveta participated in the iMAP Regional Partners
Meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (https://imap.sinarproject.org/). This
event was organized and hosted by our partner, Sinar Project, who lead
censorship measurement efforts in Southeast Asia.

As part of our participation, we attended sessions that involved
discussions on iMAP research reports (https://imap.sinarproject.org/reports),
as well as on metadata collection for test list updates.

*### Cross-Regional Convening of Digital Rights Activists in Malaysia*

On 7th May 2024, OONI’s Elizaveta attended the Cross-Regional Convening of
Digital Rights Activists of Central Asia and Southeast Asia that was
organized by Internews in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

As part of this event, Elizaveta facilitated a session on documenting and
researching internet censorship in Central Asia through the use of OONI
tools and data.

*### Countering Digital Threats to Democracy conference in Kenya*

On 21st-22nd May 2024, OONI’s Elizaveta traveled to Nairobi, Kenya, to
participate in the “Countering Digital Threats to Democracy” conference
organized by USAID (https://events.pneumaav.com/USAID).

As part of the event, Elizaveta presented OONI’s tools and work on
documenting and investigating internet censorship in African countries.

*### OONI workshop in Tanzania by community member*

On 24th May 2024, our community member, Loveness Muhagazi (Digital Safety
Consultant and author of the #Kiganjajanja online campaign) hosted an OONI
training session for human rights defenders, civil society organizations
and journalists in Tanzania.

*### OONI Community Meeting*

On 28th May 2024, we hosted the monthly OONI Community Meeting on our Slack
channel (https://slack.ooni.org/).

As part of this meeting, we discussed the following topics:

1) OONI Explorer user research: Does anyone have more feedback?
2) New OONI data processing pipeline v5: Testing and next steps for rolling
it out in production
3) A new approach to characterize network blocking with decision trees
(with an example in Russia)
4) Using soax.com for remote measurements

*## Measurement coverage*

In May 2024, 58,639,174 OONI Probe measurements were collected from 2,851
networks in 176 countries around the world.

This information can also be found through our measurement stats on OONI
Explorer (see chart on “monthly coverage worldwide”):
https://explorer.ooni.org/

~ OONI team.
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