Use of the Internet in Yemen began in 1996 through the ISPs TeleYemen and the Public Telecommunications Corporation.Percentage of Individuals using the Internet 2000-2011

International Telecommunication Union The International Telecommunication Union (ITU)In the other common languages of the ITU: * * is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information ...

, accessed on 19 August 2012. The country uses the .ye domain. As of 2020, 14% of the population are Internet users.

Growth

Rapid development of the telecommunications and information technology sectors in Yemen occurred from 2000 to 2005. The extent of investments in infrastructure development of telecom and IT systems came to more than YR 80 billion, in addition to loans of $31 million by the South Korean government. The number of

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...

users increased from just 3,800 in 1991 to 110,000 in 2006, reaching 4,072,264 by 2010. Mobile phone usage has also expanded. In 2006, there were 2.75 million mobile cellular subscribers. By 2023, the number of mobile cellular subscriptions had risen to 20 million. There has been a huge demand for faster Internet connections in Yemen, and that pushed the two ISPs, TeleYemen, operators of the service YNET, and YemenNet, through the state's powerful Ministry of Telecommunications, to introduce

ADSL Asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) is a type of digital subscriber line (DSL) technology, a data communications technology that enables faster data transmission over Copper wire, copper telephone lines than a conventional voiceband modem ...

and

ISDN Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) is a set of communication standards for simultaneous digital transmission of voice, video, data, and other network services over the digitalised circuits of the public switched telephone network. ...

connections. Also, the

E-government E-government (known for electronic government) involves utilizing technology devices, such as computers and the Internet, for faster means of delivering public services to citizens and other persons in a country or region. E-government offer ...

project that started to give the citizens the ability to access web services and finalize G2C transactions in 2000 increased the number of Internet users dramatically. But still the quality of speed is not that up to the mark. There were 84,000 fixed broadband subscriptions in 2010.Fixed broadband subscriptions

. Accessed on 8 April 2012. By 2022, the number of broadband users stood at 486,000.

Censorship

In a report by the

OpenNet Initiative The OpenNet Initiative (ONI) was a joint project whose goal was to monitor and report on internet filtering and surveillance practices by nations. Started in 2002, the project employed a number of technical means, as well as an international netwo ...

in October 2012, Yemen is listed as engaged in pervasive

Internet censorship Internet censorship is the legal control or suppression of what can be accessed, published, or viewed on the Internet. Censorship is most often applied to specific internet domains (such as ''Wikipedia.org'', for example) but exceptionally may ...

in social and political areas such as restrictions to Internet

collaboration tool A collaboration tool helps people to collaborate. The purpose of a collaboration tool is to support a group of two or more individuals to accomplish a common goal or objective. Collaboration tools can be either of a non-technological nature suc ...

s and in the conflict/security area.OpenNet Initiativ
"Summarized global Internet filtering data spreadsheet"
29 October 2012 an
"Country Profiles"
the OpenNet Initiative is a collaborative partnership of the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto; the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University; and the SecDev Group, Ottawa Yemen was included in

Reporters Without Borders Reporters Without Borders (RWB; ; RSF) is an international non-profit and non-governmental organisation, non-governmental organization headquartered in Paris, which focuses on safeguarding the right to freedom of information. It describes its a ...

list of countries "under surveillance" in 2008 and 2009, but not in 2010 or 2011.''Internet Enemies''
, Reporters Without Borders (Paris), 12 March 2012 Yemen censors pornography, nudity, gay and lesbian content, escort and dating services, sites displaying provocative attire, Web sites which present critical reviews of Islam and/or attempt to convert Muslims to other religions, or content related to alcohol, gambling, and drugs. Yemen's Ministry of Information declared in April 2008 that the penal code will be used to prosecute writers who publish Internet content that "incites hatred" or "harms national interests". Yemen's two ISPs, YemenNet and TeleYemen, block access to gambling, adult, sex education, and some religious content. The ISP TeleYemen (aka Y.Net) prohibits "sending any message which is offensive on moral, religious, communal, or political grounds" and will report "any use or attempted use of the Y.Net service which contravenes any applicable Law of the Republic of Yemen". TeleYemen reserves the right to control access to data stored in its system “in any manner deemed appropriate by TeleYemen.” In Yemen closed rooms or curtains that might obstruct views of the monitors are not allowed in Internet cafés, computer screens in Internet cafés must be visible to the floor supervisor, police have ordered some Internet cafés to close at midnight, and demanded that users show their identification cards to the café operator. In March 2015, the Ministry of Yemen denied any plans to block Facebook after the last control by

Houthis The Houthis, officially known as Ansar Allah, is a Zaydism, Zaydi Shia Islamism, Shia Islamist political and military organization that emerged from Yemen in the 1990s. It is predominantly made up of Zaydi Shias, with their namesake leadersh ...

,Yemen explains facts about blocking some social networks
(Arabic media news) though it has become apparent that the government applied bandwidth control filter to Facebook website in particular.

AdenNet

Following the 2014 Battle of Sana'a, Houthi rebels took control of YemenNet, the country's major internet service provider. Government forces aligned with

Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi (born 1 September 1945) is a Yemeni politician and former military officer who served as the second president of Yemen from 2012 until his resignation in 2022. He previously served as the second vice president of Yemen fro ...

created AdenNet in June 2018 as an alternative ISP.

References

{{Internet censorship by country Telecommunications in Yemen Science and technology in Yemen

Yemen Yemen, officially the Republic of Yemen, is a country in West Asia. Located in South Arabia, southern Arabia, it borders Saudi Arabia to Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, the north, Oman to Oman–Yemen border, the northeast, the south-eastern part ...

Growth

Censorship

AdenNet

See also

References