April 30th, 2022 - NFT fundraising campaign website of Malaysian graphics designer and political activist Fahmi Reza, yesterday was detected as being blocked through DNS tampering by multiple Malaysian Internet Service Providers. 

The website features satirical artwork of a cartoon monkey featuring colors and clothing resembling those worn by Malaysian royalty, for which the artist was previously arrested and investigated under Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act for an offensive online posting.

Open Observatory for Network Interference measurements first detected DNS tampering for the website monyetistana.com at 2.52pm, April 29 on Celcom ISP network. The measurement data indicates the block is in place under direction of the regulatory body,  Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), as it has been previously reported by the Malay Mail, that 175.139.142.25 is the IP address ISPs are ordered to redirect blocked websites to during 14th General Elections.

Following previous patterns of data indicating an official block request, DNS tampering measurements were then detected on networks of other ISPs of TM Net, Maxis Broadband, and Digi Telecommunications.

Findings

On 29 April 2022, test measurements of the website monyetistana.com showed signs of blocking through DNS tampering from the following internet service providers:

• Maxis Broadband (measurement)
• Digi Telecommunications (measurement)
• Celcom Axiata (measurement)
• TM Net Telekom (measurement)

All related network interference measurements for the website, can be viewed on OONI Explorer.

Thank you to Malaysian OONI Probe  users for helping run network measurement tests.

About iMAP

Internet Monitoring Action Project (iMAP) monitors internet censorship, network interference and restrictions to the freedom of expression online, through fostering the development of regional and national network of digital activists working on internet censorship and monitoring. iMAP is currently monitoring and reporting Internet censorship in Myanmar, Cambodia, Hong Kong (China), India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam.

About OONI

The Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI) is a free software project that aims to empower decentralized efforts in increasing transparency of internet censorship around the world. OONI is the leading open source censorship detection platform collecting data from over 200 countries on a monthly basis. This project significantly advances both the capabilities and proliferation of the platform enabling members of the internet freedom community to rapidly respond to such events in promotion and protection of human rights and democracy.