Human Rights Group Accuse Vodafone of Shutting Down Egypt Network

Lobbying group AccessNow last Tuesday accosted the London-based operator at its annual meeting, bringing a resolution to the company regarding its role in Egypt's revolution this spring. Vodafone says Egyptian officials forced it to send out pro-government messages and eventually shut down the network during the January uprisings, stymying emergency services in the country as well as crippling communications.

Vodafone claimed it restored service after 24 hours, but access to the Internet remained blocked for five days.

AccessNow's reprimand against Vodafone signals the precarious position carriers and operators occupy as social and political mobile-based technology and social media continue to fuel social change. The so-called "Arab Spring" gained much of its momentum through the Internet and cell phones, with information, images and news transmitted within and beyond borders quickly, and sometimes covertly, over handsets.

Beyond Egypt, which deposed President Hosni Mubarek after a period of revolution, Tunisia, Libya, Turkey, and others protested entrenched regimes using Facebook, Twitter and handsets to speed up the pace of change.

AccessNow, an NGO that fights for the incorporation of human rights in telcom policies, demanded in its resolution that Vodafone hold itself accountable for the shutdown and asked it to create a plan to uphold human rights in the future.

"How prepared are you for the future crises that are sure to happen in the 70-odd countries in which you operate?" asked Brett Solomon, director of lobby group Access. "Will you ensure that you are both able to protect your staff and the integrity of the network, but not in the position of having to once again shut down the internet or send pro-regime messages to your customers?"

Access is also demanding clear protocols be drawn up for Vodafone markets in Bahrain, China and Malaysia. Bahrain has seen political unrest recently and has shut down mobile services in the past.

Mubarek has already been fined a total of $91 million for cutting Internet and phone service during the country's protests. Vodafone may be facing more repercussions from its shareholders for allowing the shutdown to happen, though the company insists it is beholden to legal agreements within countries, and says an approach to human rights and telecom policies must include governments as well as industry and NGOs.

Mobile communications, from handsets to networks, is increasingly the most important conduit for worldwide political change. Carriers like Vodafone may continue to be caught in the crosshairs until clearly laid-out policies and agreements with governments better define networks' roles in political situations. But such negotiations will likely take time to hammer out.

For their part, governments are keenly aware of the relationship between mobile technology and social change, for better or for worse -- Iran plans to clamp down on the Internet within its borders in two years, replacing the Web with a government-sponsored network that will control the flow of information.