Goodbye, all you online friends and enemies, I see a cop with a hammer

The phenomenon of social media has had such a deep impact on the ways that we communicate and live our lives, that it is impossible to overstate its importance.

One simply cannot use a superlative too overblown to describe just how important social media is. And I say this as someone who approaches this area of life with some caution, having an analogue soul.

Nonetheless, resistance is futile: Many hours of my day are spent tending to the bleeps and chirps and winking LED face of my constant electronic companion.

So it is with some sadness that I bid farewell to the freedom that Tanzanians used to enjoy. Our Cyber Crime Act of 2015 kicks in this September. I believe the designers of this law as well as the legislators when they say that this law is well intended.

Cybercrime is real and thriving here; technology coupled with creativity will always provide opportunities for mischief. The government should probably be commended for trying to address the problem head-on.

And because this is the government we are talking about, of course the law has a dark side. Under the guise of limiting the dissemination of destructive content like racism, religious discrimination, cyber-bullying, child pornography et cetera, the government has given itself immense powers to reach into civilians’ communications.

The extent of liability is astonishing: Simply possessing unlawful material can get you into trouble! Worse yet, it is the police of all people who now have the power to confiscate devices for the purposes of investigation.

That same police that can’t be trusted to apprehend human bodies without causing some damage are supposed to be entrusted with electronic goods?

I wouldn’t put it past my friendly neighbourhood policeman Afande Rungu to use a hammer to pry open a laptop to get at the information inside. But that’s the least of our worries.

The Cyber Crime Act has been dubbed the ShutUp Law by denizens of our cyberspace who are justifiably worried about its effect on freedom of speech, on privacy.

Freedom and privacy don’t truly clash in the cybersphere, not the way most of us imagine. Here is a fun fact: In 2008, in a six-month period, the spy program Optic Nerve (a joint US/UK action) captured one still image every five minutes from Yahoo Chat web camera users. Of those images 3-11 per cent were naughty, frisky pictures.

Puts that adventurous little selfie you may have sent one time to a friend in context, doesn’t it?

The rest of the article “10 spy programs with silly codenames used by GCHQ and NSA,” by Sherif Al-Sayed Ali is available on Amnesty’s website. It’s not just governments, companies are spying on you too for commercial reasons. A healthy dose of paranoia is not a liability in this day and age.

That said, the very lack of any sensation of restraint or regulation gives social media its unique and discursive nature. It has certainly opened up Tanzanian society for better or worse, and it is amusing to see our reputation for political docility persist in spite of our public conversations.

This makes the timing of the Cyber Crime Act simply masterful. One month before the most hotly contested General Election we have ever seen, just as the campaigns take off, the state has issued a rather unsubtle threat to the people. In the name of security, of course.

Controlling public online speech is never a good idea for governments: It may be easy to crush a physical demonstration, but cybernauts are notoriously impossible to shut up.

The creativity that the collective can bring to circumventing barriers to communication should also not be underestimated. So this is not bidding farewell to freedom so much as to the sensation of freedom, of conviviality.

And a literal farewell to a number of groups and online friends never met in the flesh, for protective purposes.

Malicious dissemination of illegal content is probably about to become a real job for someone in Tanzania in the next quarter. When one door “closes,” it seems to open about a dozen more for entrepreneurial types.

Elsie Eyakuze is an independent consultant and blogger for The Mikocheni Report, http://mikochenireport.blogspot.com. E-mail: [email protected]