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The story about “blocking” Skype, Facebook and WhatsApp in Azerbaijan, that started last month, gathers pace as the Minister of Communications and Information Technologies, Ali Abbasov, made an official statement.

According to the Azerbaijani bureau of Radio Sputnik, Abbasov stated that the activities of those applications must be licensed in Azerbaijan since they provide telecommunication services. He assured “the licensing of the above-mentioned social networks will not imply any changes for the users.”

Microsoft Azerbaijan strategist Gachay Mirzayev commented the authorities’ decision to license the three applications for the information agency Trend. “As far as I know, such practice is not applied anywhere else in the world,” he said.
In addition to licensing, the Azerbaijani authorities intend to move the social media and internet telephony (Skype, WhatsApp and others) users’ data into the country, motivated “by the particular importance from the point of view of cyber security,” Ali Abbasov said, as cited by Trend. Abbasov’s office “is going to apply to the companies to keep all the resources concerning Azerbaijan directly in the territory of the country.” Particularly, this concerns the “regional DATA-Center,” owned by AzTelecom, Ltd. and expected to launch in September 2015.

However, Ali Abbasov and his office’s optimistic views about cyber security are not shared by everyone. “The tendencies of social media control reached Azerbaijan,” Haqqin.az writes. It draws parallels with China and Iran, where the free access to information is controlled by strict limits.

Mushvig Amirov, the advisor to the Minister of Communications and Information Technologies, said “exceptionally American companies” must have representations in Azerbaijan in accord with the local legislature. “These two companies, among others, gain a lot money in Azerbaijan. Therefore, taxation issues should also be discussed with them,” Amirov stated.

Haqqin.az has concerns that the authorities may restrict access to the social networks, which “is actually equal to shuttering the Internet.” Consequently, this will tell on “the efficiency of the economy, culture, and finally, the press in the country, whose work is highly connected either with search, or saving data on the Google cloud.”

In June 2015, the chairman of the Press Council of Azerbaijan stated that Facebook administration must block the ‘anti-Azerbaijani’ pages, and urged to cut off access to Facebook in Azerbaijan in case they failed to do that. In July, issues were observed in the work of WhatsApp; a few days later, problems occurred also with Skype calls. Local press reported that the Special State Protection Service of Azerbaijan was responsible for the blocks.

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