In September 2018, problems with access to Facebook, YouTube and other services occurred in Uzbekistan. They had taken systemic nature from October 2018.

The cause of the problems was not called then, but the services were available via VPN, which led to a sharp surge in their popularity. Amid these problems, doing business in Uzbekistan was suffering losses. At the beginning of the year, the problems were fixed, Spot writes.

The head of the Agency for Information and Mass Communications Komil Allamjonov, as part of the Alter Ego project, has told blogger Kirill Altman that the agency has contributed to solving the problem. According to Allamjonov, people, who blocked Facebook and YouTube, are already in prison.

Reportedly, those people decided that the negative in the network could be dealt using such measures i.e. blocking:

“The point was that, in their opinion, there was suddenly a lot of negativity. And they decided that by blocking Facebook and YouTube, negative information could be reduced. I had a very serious debate with them on this topic. I said that it is necessary to combat the negative with counterarguments, counter-facts. This is a long process, but it is the correct way. There is no other option. Nowadays, by turning off the Internet, you won’t achieve anything. Well, Facebook was blocked, and what happened in the end? Everyone started using VPN,” head of the agency said.

One can watch Alter Ego interview with Komil Allamjonov on Mover and YouTube.