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One might imagine that a global repository of knowledge like Wikipedia would be universally embraced. One would be wrong, of course. For those who find the free dissemination of information inconvenient, Wikipedia has become a recurring target for censorship by various governments across the globe. This isn't a phenomenon limited to a single ideology or region; it’s a remarkably consistent display of power asserting itself against the simple act of looking something up. Countries that have, at various points, deemed Wikipedia too dangerous for their citizens include, but are certainly not limited to, China, Iran, Myanmar, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi_Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, and Turkmenistan. In many of these cases, the blocking of Wikipedia isn't an isolated incident but rather a symptom of broader, more pervasive Internet censorship, where access to a wide array of online content is restricted. Other, more targeted measures have been employed to prevent the viewing of specific articles or topics that a regime might find particularly distasteful or threatening to its narrative.

A significant shift occurred in June 2015 when Wikipedia transitioned entirely to HTTPS. Prior to this, governments possessed the technical capability to block access to individual articles, allowing for a more surgical approach to information control. However, the widespread adoption of HTTPS encryption meant that censors were faced with a starker choice: either permit access to the entire site, including its "problematic" content, or execute a full block, denying access to all knowledge it contained. This forced a clumsy, all-or-nothing hand, which, as you'll see, didn't deter them for long.

Widespread censorship of Wikipedia

The act of censoring Wikipedia is a testament to the enduring human desire to control narratives, often under the guise of protecting national security, public morality, or cultural values. It's a game of digital whack-a-mole, played with varying degrees of subtlety and brute force.

Types of censorship

The methods employed to silence or manipulate Wikipedia are as diverse as the justifications given for them, ranging from blunt, comprehensive blocks to more insidious attempts at prosecution and even content manipulation. These aren't just technical measures; they are deliberate acts designed to shape public perception and suppress dissenting voices.

Blocking all Wikipedia sites (in one or every language)

This is the digital equivalent of drawing the curtains and pretending the outside world doesn't exist. Some nations, notably China, have maintained prolonged and consistent blocks on Wikipedia for years, treating the entire platform as an unacceptable conduit of information. Other countries have deployed these widespread blocks for shorter, though still significant, durations. Syria, for instance, has implemented blocks lasting several months, while Pakistan has occasionally resorted to blanket bans that lasted mere hours. The rationale is often simple: if you can't control the message, eliminate the messenger entirely. It's a blunt instrument, but undeniably effective in the short term, leaving users in an informational vacuum.

Blocking specific articles

Before Wikipedia made the inevitable move from HTTP to the more secure HTTPS in June 2015, governments had a much easier time playing the content gatekeeper. This allowed them to precisely target articles on "sensitive" topics. We're talking about anything from political opposition ideologies, reports on current events that might contradict state narratives (a common occurrence in Russia), or concepts deemed to be in direct conflict with a regime's religious or cultural traditions (as seen in Iran). The beauty of HTTPS, from a user's perspective, is that it encrypts the traffic, making it significantly more challenging for state censors to discern which specific pages a user is attempting to visit within Wikipedia. This technological shift effectively forced censors to abandon their surgical approach and choose between either permitting access to all content or committing to blocking the entire site, a decision that often comes with its own set of inconvenient public relations headaches.

Prosecuting editors

The stakes, it seems, are rather high for those who dare to contribute to the collective knowledge. Beyond merely blocking access, some governments have taken the alarming step of prosecuting individuals who edit Wikipedia articles. These prosecutions typically target editors who publish information that directly contradicts or undermines a government's preferred narrative, creating a chilling effect that often leads to widespread self-censorship within the local editing community. The message is clear: contribute the "wrong" information, and you risk your freedom. The List of people imprisoned for editing Wikipedia serves as a grim testament to the very real dangers faced by those who merely seek to document reality.

Prosecuting readers

While direct government mass surveillance of Wikipedia usage has become significantly harder to track since the platform's full transition to HTTPS in 2015, one shouldn't mistake a lack of reports for a lack of activity. The landscape of digital surveillance is ever-evolving, and some governments and private entities have proven rather adept at installing mass surveillance spyware applications directly onto user devices. These applications are sophisticated enough to detect the use of VPN software – the very tools many use to bypass censorship – and meticulously record visited URLs. So, while the direct monitoring of Wikipedia traffic might be obscured, the broader ecosystem of surveillance ensures that even the act of trying to access "forbidden" knowledge can carry risks for the diligent reader. It's a reminder that truly free information often comes at a cost, even if that cost is just your digital privacy.

By country

The global map of Wikipedia censorship is a patchwork of paranoia and control, each country painting its own particular shade of denial. While the motivations are often depressingly similar, the specific circumstances and durations of these blocks vary wildly, offering a grim tour of how various authorities attempt to manage what their citizens are allowed to know.

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| | Belarus | 11 March 2022, 7 April 2022 | | All versions | | Yes | The government of Belarus, under the authoritarian rule of Alexander Lukashenka, has taken severe measures against Wikipedia editors, particularly those involved in documenting sensitive political events. On 11 March 2022, GUBOPiK, the Belarusian political police, arrested and detained Mark Bernstein, a prominent editor of the Russian Wikipedia residing in Minsk. His alleged crime was editing the article concerning the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He was accused of the "spread of anti-Russian materials" and, in a bizarre application of extraterritorial law, of violating Russian "fake news" laws. This incident highlighted the regime's willingness to crack down on independent information, even when it originates from a global, collaborative platform. This wasn't an isolated event; on 7 April 2022, a court in Brest sentenced another Wikipedia user, Pavel Pernikaŭ, to a two-year prison term. His conviction stemmed from three specific edits made to articles on both the Russian and Belarusian Wikipedia. He was found guilty under Article 369-1 of the Criminal Code of Belarus, which broadly criminalizes "discrediting the Republic of Belarus." These cases serve as a stark warning to any citizen contemplating contributing factual information that deviates from the state-sanctioned narrative. | | China | 2004, 2005–2008, 2015–present (https), April 2019–present (all) | All | All versions | Yes | Yes | The relationship between China and Wikipedia has been, to put it mildly, fraught with conflict, evolving into a continuous cat-and-mouse game where the state consistently tries to assert its control over information. This long-standing struggle is well-documented under the broader umbrellas of Wikimedia censorship in mainland China and Internet censorship in China. Access to Wikipedia within mainland China has fluctuated dramatically over the years, with the Chinese Wikipedia typically facing far tighter restrictions than its counterparts in other languages. As of April 2019, the situation escalated to a full-scale blockade, with all versions of Wikipedia being inaccessible in mainland China, effectively swallowed by the infamous Great Firewall.

The Chinese Wikipedia itself was first launched in May 2001. Initially, it even received some positive, if cautious, coverage in China's state press in early 2004. However, this brief honeymoon ended abruptly on 3 June 2004, when the site was blocked. The timing was hardly coincidental, preceding the 15th anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre—a date the Chinese government goes to extraordinary lengths to erase from public memory. In response, there were internal discussions within the Chinese Wikipedia community about whether to practice self-censorship as a means to restore access, but these proposals were ultimately rejected. Despite this, an investigation by the International Herald Tribune revealed that Chinese entries on politically sensitive topics like Mao Zedong and Taiwan were often "watered down and sanitized" of controversy, suggesting a subtle, pre-emptive form of content management. Access was briefly restored on 22 June 2004, only to be blocked again in September for four days, and then once more in October 2005. During this period, concerned users like Shi Zhao and Cui Wei wrote appeals to authorities, arguing that blocking Wikipedia hindered China's ability to present its own voice and allowed "evil cults, Taiwan independence forces and others...to present a distorted image of China."

In October 2006, The New York Times reported a curious development: the English Wikipedia appeared to be unblocked, while the Chinese version remained largely inaccessible. However, this "unblocking" was far from complete, as noted by new media researcher Andrew Lih, who found that he still couldn't access the English article on the Tiananmen Square protests. Lih also highlighted the non-uniform nature of the Great Firewall, observing that accessibility varied depending on the internet service provider and geographical location within China. Reporters Without Borders commended Wikipedia's leadership for resisting self-censorship during this period.

A glimmer of hope emerged on 10 November 2006, when Lih reported that the Chinese Wikipedia seemed to have been fully unblocked. This was quickly confirmed, and the effects were immediate and dramatic: the rate of new account creation more than tripled, and article creation surged by 75%, making it the second fastest-growing Wikipedia after the English version. Lih optimistically predicted rapid growth but also noted the challenge of integrating so many new users into Wikipedia's established policies and norms. However, this openness was fleeting. By 16 November 2006, Reuters reported that while the main page was accessible, articles on "taboo political subjects," such as "4 June, 1989 protests," remained blocked. The very next day, 17 November, both the Chinese and English versions were reportedly reblocked.

The pattern of intermittent blocking and unblocking continued. On 15 June 2007, non-political articles on the English Wikipedia were restored, only for the entire English version to be blocked again by 6 September 2007. Then, on 2 April 2008, The Register and BBC reported that blocks on both English and Chinese Wikipedias were lifted, a move widely attributed to foreign journalists arriving in Beijing for the 2008 Summer Olympics and the International Olympic Committee's demand for press freedom during the games. Following this, in September 2008, Jimmy Wales met with Cai Mingzhao, Vice Director of China's State Council Information Office, hoping to open a channel of communication with the government of China.

The academic community also took notice. A 2011 report in the American Economic Review found that the blocking of the Chinese Wikipedia not only reduced its user base but also decreased the contributions of unblocked users by an average of 42.8%, illustrating the chilling effect of state censorship.

By 2012, both the Chinese and English Wikipedias were generally accessible, except for political articles. Any attempt to access or search for a "sensitive" article would result in a temporary block of the user's IP address from Wikipedia for several minutes to an hour. This was a more sophisticated, albeit still frustrating, form of control.

The shift to secure HTTPS connections, which began on 31 May 2013, presented a new challenge for Chinese authorities. While the non-secure HTTP version remained vulnerable to keyword filtering, HTTPS made it harder to selectively block individual articles. GreatFire, an organization dedicated to circumventing Chinese censorship, urged Wikipedia and its users to utilize other IP addresses owned by Wikipedia with HTTPS to bypass the block. Around this time, Jimmy Wales famously declared that Wikipedia would not tolerate "5 seconds" of censorship. This assertion was met with skepticism by some Chinese internet researchers, who suggested that Wikipedia might be less defiant when faced with demands from Western governments. Meanwhile, a Chinese Wikipedia administrator, Huang, reported being under an exit ban by the government since 2009 without clear reason, demonstrating the personal cost of such work.

The cat-and-mouse game continued: GreatFire reported that both encrypted and unencrypted Chinese Wikipedia were blocked on 19 May 2015. Since June 2015, all Wikipedias have redirected HTTP requests to HTTPS addresses, making encryption mandatory. This rendered the entire site inaccessible in China, as censors could no longer identify and block specific pages like those on Ai Weiwei, Liu Xiaobo, or Tiananmen Square.

In December 2015, Jimmy Wales announced his intention to lobby the Chinese government to unblock the site. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, China then completely blocked all language versions of Wikipedia on 4 December. This led to widespread complaints on Chinese social networks, which were, predictably, quickly deleted. Access to other languages was briefly restored on 6 December. Wales later met with Lu Wei, director of the Cyberspace Administration of China, on 17 December 2015. Wales reiterated Wikipedia's stance against censorship, stating, "Never," when asked if he would compromise. The official translation of his remarks at the World Internet Conference even saw his statement about machine translation making information control "no longer possible" warped into "help governments to better analyze online communications."

The most recent, and arguably most comprehensive, blockade began on 23 April 2019, when all versions of Wikipedia were once again blocked in China. This move effectively cemented the Great Firewall's dominance over access to this global knowledge resource.

The conflict extended beyond simple blocking. On 23 September 2020, the Chinese government rejected Wikimedia's application for official observer status at the World Intellectual Property Organization. China's representative claimed that Wikimedia's webpages contained "a large amount of content and disinformation in violation of [the] One China principle" and that Wikimedia's Taiwan branch was "carrying out political activities...which could undermine the state's sovereignty and territorial integrity." This rejection was repeated on 5 October 2021.

The state's control even extended to individual citizens. On 24 October 2020, a Chinese citizen in Zhoushan, Zhejiang, was penalized by local police for the "crime" of "illegally visiting Wikipedia." This incident underscored the personal risks involved in circumventing state censorship.

Perhaps the most unsettling development has been the alleged infiltration of Wikipedia's editorial processes. Despite the blanket ban, some mainland Chinese users were granted IP block exemptions, leading to accusations that these users were recruited to promote the Chinese government's viewpoint and influence the election of pro-Beijing administrators. Academics have even suggested that "China urgently needs to encourage and train Chinese netizens to become Wikipedia platform opinion leaders and administrators...[who] can adhere to socialist values and form some core editorial teams." This strategy has led to significant clashes, particularly with Taiwanese editors, over content and even death threats against Taiwan's Wikipedian community. One Taiwanese editor speculated that this wasn't merely patriotic fervor but a "larger structural coordinated strategy the government has to manipulate these platforms" beyond Wikipedia, extending to sites like Twitter and Facebook.

The group known as Wikimedians of Mainland China (WMC or WMCUG) has been at the center of these controversies. They reportedly threatened to report Wikipedia editors to Hong Kong's national security police hotline over the heavily disputed article on the "2019–2020 Hong Kong protests," an article characterized by intense edit warring. An anonymous Hong Kong-based editor noted that "Pro-Beijing people often remove content that is sympathetic to protests, such as tear gas being fired and images of barricades. They also add their own content," while accusing pro-Beijing editors of being "a lot more aggressive in churning out disinformation."

This culminated in a significant intervention by the Wikimedia Foundation on 13 September 2021, when it banned seven Wikipedia users and stripped twelve members of the WMC of their administrator privileges. Maggie Dennis, the foundation's vice president of community resilience and sustainability, stated that a year-long investigation into "infiltration concerns" had revealed threats to the "very foundations of Wikipedia." Dennis explicitly linked the infiltrators to attempts to promote "the aims of China, as interpreted through whatever filters they may bring to bear," suggesting possible ties to the Chinese Communist Party. She emphasized the need to act based on "credible information that some members (not all) of that group [WMC] have harassed, intimidated, and threatened other members of our community, including in some cases physically harming others, in order to secure their own power and subvert the collaborative nature of our projects." It seems the battle for information isn't just external; it's an internal struggle for the integrity of the platform itself. | | India | July 2024, 21 October 2024, 17 March 2025, 9 May 2025 | | Select pages | | | The saga of Wikipedia in India presents a fascinating, if somewhat convoluted, illustration of the tensions between digital freedom and national legal systems, particularly concerning issues of alleged defamation and judicial overreach. This is further detailed under Internet censorship in India.

In July 2024, Asian News International (ANI), a prominent Indian news agency, initiated legal proceedings against the Wikimedia Foundation. ANI sued Wikimedia with the explicit aim of uncovering the identities of Wikipedia editors who had characterized the news agency as a "propaganda tool for the government" on the platform. ANI alleged that these editors had engaged in defamation. The Delhi High Court responded with a rather aggressive stance, threatening to block Wikipedia across India if the names of these editors were not divulged. This move sparked considerable debate about the court's jurisdiction over a global platform and the implications for editor anonymity.

The situation escalated dramatically on 21 October 2024, when the Wikimedia Foundation took the unprecedented step of suspending access to the article for the lawsuit itself on the English Wikipedia. This action was taken in direct compliance with a court order from the Delhi High Court, which asserted that the article violated the sub judice principle—the legal rule preventing public discussion of cases still before a court. This marked a significant moment, believed to be the first instance of an English Wikipedia page being taken down following a court order.

However, the legal narrative took another turn. On 17 March 2025, the Supreme Court of India, the country's highest judicial body, began to question the rationale behind the Delhi High Court's order. The Supreme Court notably asked why the High Court was being "so touchy" about the issue, further emphasizing that courts should not demand the removal of content merely because it is critical of them. Justices Abhay S. Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan highlighted the profound implications of the case for press freedom, stating, "This concerns press freedom. If it is Wikipedia today, it could be someone else tomorrow."

Ultimately, the Delhi High Court's order to remove the article was overturned on appeal to the Supreme Court of India. The Supreme Court delivered a decisive ruling, asserting that in a liberal democracy, the judiciary and media must operate in a mutually supportive manner, and it is not the role of the court to dictate content removal or takedown demands to the media. Consequently, on 9 May 2025, the article was restored, marking a significant victory for freedom of information and speech within the Indian legal landscape. | | Iran | 2013–2015 (partial), 2023–present (Wikinews) | Partial [ failed verification ] | Hundreds of articles | | | Iran's approach to Internet censorship in Iran is a meticulously crafted digital curtain, and Wikipedia has consistently found itself caught in its folds. A detailed November 2013 report by researchers Collin Anderson and Nima Nazeri from the Center for Global Communication Studies at the University of Pennsylvania meticulously scanned 800,000 Persian-language Wikipedia articles. Their findings were stark: the Iranian government had blocked 963 of these pages. The patterns of censorship were revealing, as the authors noted: "Censors repeatedly targeted Wikipedia pages about government rivals, minority religious beliefs, and criticisms of the state, officials, and the police." A significant portion—just under half—of these blocked pages were biographies, including those of individuals whom authorities had allegedly detained or killed.

Anderson insightfully observed that the Persian Wikipedia, in its very nature, serves as a "useful place to uncover the types of online content forbidden and an excellent template to identify keyword blocking themes and filtering rules that apply across the greater internet." This highlights Wikipedia's unintended role as a barometer for state-controlled information. The censorship continued into May 2014, with Mashable reporting that at least two more pages on the Persian Wikipedia were blocked.

The disruptions to access were not limited to specific articles. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, access to Wikipedia was reportedly disrupted across Iranian networks, as noted by the Associated Press. This suggests that even critical public health information, if not directly controlled, could become collateral damage in broader network interventions. As of 2023, Wikinews Farsi remains blocked, and XTools, a set of tools used by Wikipedia editors for statistics and analysis, was also inaccessible for several months, further hindering the work of the editing community. This persistent, targeted censorship reveals a government deeply invested in shaping the information landscape available to its citizens, meticulously pruning away any narratives that challenge its authority or ideology. | | North Korea | | All | All versions | | | In North Korea, the concept of Wikipedia censorship is almost quaint, given the extreme isolation of the country. The entire World Wide Web is not merely filtered or selectively blocked; it is, for all practical purposes, physically disconnected from the vast majority of the population. Access to the global internet, and by extension, Wikipedia, is strictly limited to a minuscule elite within the government and military, and even then, under heavy surveillance. For the average citizen, the internet as the rest of the world knows it simply does not exist. Instead, they operate within a highly controlled national intranet, the Kwangmyong, which offers no access to outside information. Thus, Wikipedia is not "blocked" in the conventional sense; it's simply beyond the reach of a society that has been deliberately cut off from the global information flow, making any discussion of specific article censorship moot in the face of absolute digital isolation. | | Myanmar | 15 February 2021 – present | All | All versions | | | Following the military coup d'état on 1 February 2021, the junta in Myanmar swiftly moved to consolidate its control over information, plunging the country into a digital blackout. On 21 February 2021, Wikipedia was completely blocked in all languages, becoming another casualty of the military's aggressive [censorship](/Censorship regime. This comprehensive blockade meant that citizens were cut off from a vital source of independent information and global knowledge at a time when accurate news was most crucial. The move was part of a broader strategy to suppress dissent and control the narrative surrounding the coup, effectively isolating the population from external perspectives and internal organizing efforts. As of the latest reports, this blanket ban remains in place, reflecting the junta's ongoing efforts to maintain an iron grip on the flow of information. | | Pakistan | 31 March 2006, several days in May 2010, 3 February 2023 – 6 February 2023 | Partial | Some, all versions | | | Pakistan's history with Wikipedia censorship is marked by intermittent, often religiously motivated, blocks, as part of its broader Internet censorship in Pakistan policies. The first notable incident occurred on 31 March 2006, when the entire domain of wikipedia.org was blocked for a period of seven hours. The reason? A single article that contained information pertaining to the controversial cartoons of Muhammad. This swift and comprehensive response demonstrated the authorities' sensitivity to content deemed blasphemous.

A few years later, in May 2010, the English Wikipedia was again blocked in Pakistan for several days. This time, the ban was enacted amidst the controversy surrounding "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day](/Everybody_Draw_Mohammed_Day)," another event that sparked widespread outrage and demands for content removal.

The pattern re-emerged in early 2023, with a more dramatic escalation. On 1 February 2023, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) announced that it had "degraded" Wikipedia services, effectively slowing access for 48 hours. The PTA's ultimatum was clear: if "sacrilegious content" was not removed, a full block would follow. When Wikipedia did not comply, Pakistani authorities indeed blocked access to the platform on 3 February. This move was met with criticism from various quarters, highlighting the tension between religious sensitivities and freedom of information.

However, this block proved to be remarkably short-lived. On 6 February 2023, just three days after the ban was implemented, the Pakistani prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, intervened. He ordered the PTA to immediately lift the ban on Wikipedia, stating that "Wikipedia was a useful site/portal which supported the dissemination of knowledge and information for the general public, students and the academia." This reversal underscored a pragmatic recognition of Wikipedia's value, even in the face of contentious content. As of 15 June 2025 [update], most parts of Wikipedia are accessible, although Wikimedia Commons, which hosts many of the images, remains inaccessible, suggesting a continued, albeit partial, effort to control certain types of content.

Wikinews has related news:
• Pakistan reverses block on Wikimedia projects, including Wikipedia | | Russia | 2010s–present [ needs update ] | Partial [ needs update ] | Select pages | Yes | Yes | The Russian government's relationship with Wikipedia has steadily deteriorated since the early 2010s, evolving into a systematic campaign of control and suppression, extensively documented in articles like Block of Wikipedia in Russia, Disinformation in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Internet censorship in Russia, Mass surveillance in Russia, Russian information war against Ukraine, and Wikipedia and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Russian Wikipedia and its dedicated editors have faced an escalating barrage of threats, including the specter of nationwide blocks and the country-wide enforcement of blacklisting by the Russian government. These efforts have been accompanied by numerous attempts to censor pages, spread state-sanctioned propaganda, and inject disinformation into articles. This became particularly pronounced during the 2014 Russo-Ukrainian war in the Donbas region and has intensified dramatically with the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine since 2022.

The regulatory body, the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (more commonly known as Roskomnadzor), confirmed Wikipedia's blacklisting on 5 April 2013, noting with a certain bureaucratic exasperation, "it had been 'for a long time. I don't know why it's only now that they've woken up'." On the same day, Roskomnadzor issued an order to the Russian Wikipedia: remove the article "Курение каннабиса" ("Cannabis smoking") or face a complete block of Wikipedia across Russia. The legal framework for such actions expanded significantly after a new law was passed around November 2013, granting the government broader powers to block content deemed illegal or harmful to children, a conveniently broad definition.

A more direct confrontation arose on 18 August 2015, when Roskomnadzor demanded that Russian Wikipedia administrators delete the article "Чарас (наркотическое вещество)" ("Charas (narcotic substance)"), which detailed the cannabis derivative charas, by 21 August. Failure to comply would result in a block, a threat they partially executed on 25 August. A Russian provincial court had deemed the article to contain a "detailed description of how to make a narcotic," thus classifying it as prohibited information. Roskomnadzor's justification for a full site block was pragmatic, if heavy-handed: "insofar as Wikipedia has decided to function on the basis of https, which doesn't allow restricting to individual pages on its site, the entire website would be blocked" if they did not comply. Vladimir Medeyko, director of NP Wikimedia RU, countered that the article had already been rewritten to meet the order's conditions, using scientific articles and UN documents, and attempted to preserve the content by transferring it to the article "Гашиш" ("Hashish"). Wikipedia representatives vowed to appeal and file a complaint against Roskomnadzor if a block was enforced. In anticipation, the Russian Wikipedia published a resource titled "What to do if Wikipedia was blocked." On 24 August, Roskomnadzor ordered Russian internet providers to block Wikipedia. By the night of 25 August, 10–20% of Russian users experienced access issues. However, on the very same day, the charas article was removed from the registry of banned sites after the Federal Drug Control Service acknowledged that "sufficient edits were made that met the conditions of court order."

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 drastically escalated the information war. In the initial weeks, Russian Wikipedia editors alerted users to "several, reiterated attempts" by the Putin-led Russian government to engage in political censorship, Internet propaganda, disinformation attacks, and disruptive editing, particularly targeting articles listing Russian military casualties as well as Ukrainian civilians and children due to the ongoing war. On 1 March 2022, Roskomnadzor explicitly threatened to block the Russian Wikipedia over its article ru:Вторжение России на Украину (2022) ("Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022)"). The regulator claimed the article contained "illegally distributed information," including "reports about numerous casualties among service personnel of the Russian Federation and also the civilian population of Ukraine, including children"—information that directly contradicted the official state narrative.

The financial penalties soon followed. On 31 March 2022, Roskomnadzor threatened Wikipedia with a fine of up to 4 million rubles (approximately $49,000) if it failed to delete "misinforming" content about the war. In April–May 2022, several Wikipedia articles were added to Russia's list of forbidden sites, including "2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine," "Ruscism," several articles detailing military actions and war crimes during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and even two sections within the Russian Wikipedia article about Vladimir Putin himself.

On 20 July 2022, in a further attempt to isolate Wikipedia, Roskomnadzor ordered Russian search engines to label Wikipedia as a "violator of Russian laws" due to its refusal to remove articles about the war. The fines continued to mount: on 1 November 2022, the Wikimedia Foundation was fined 2 million rubles, and again on 13 April 2023, by a Russian court for its steadfast refusal to delete the contested articles.

The crackdown extended to individuals and organizations. In December 2023, Stanislav Kozlovsky, the director of Wikimedia Russia, was officially designated as a "foreign agent" by the Justice Ministry of Russia. This designation, a tool often used to silence dissent, led to his expulsion from Moscow University, where he taught. Consequently, Wikimedia Russia was forced to disband, effectively dismantling the local support structure for the platform.

In February 2024, Russian presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky offered a revealing perspective, suggesting that while 99% of Wikipedia articles were "absolutely neutral and even interesting," a crucial 1% constituted "enemy slander." He then openly advocated for the creation of a "native Russian online encyclopedia alternative" that would supposedly be based on Wikipedia's content but presumably with that "enemy slander" surgically removed. This underscores the government's dual strategy: suppress inconvenient truths on existing platforms while simultaneously attempting to build state-controlled alternatives that present a curated, sanitized version of reality. | | Saudi Arabia | 2000s–present [ needs update ] | Partial [ needs update ] | Select pages | Yes | Yes | The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has a long-standing practice of Internet censorship in Saudi Arabia, often citing moral and religious grounds, but frequently extending to politically sensitive content. Wikipedia has not been immune to these restrictions. On 11 July 2006, the Saudi government imposed a block on both Wikipedia and Google Translate. The stated reason was the presence of sexual and politically sensitive content. Google Translate was included in the ban because users were cleverly employing it to bypass existing filters by translating blocked sites, a testament to the ingenuity of those seeking information.

While Wikipedia is generally accessible in Saudi Arabia today, specific pages were reportedly censored as recently as 2011, with examples including an article discussing the theory of evolution, a topic often contentious in conservative religious contexts. However, the widespread adoption of encrypted connections over HTTPS has made this kind of surgical, page-specific censorship significantly more challenging for authorities. Currently, there is no public evidence to suggest that individual Wikipedia pages are still being selectively blocked by the Saudi government, though the broader surveillance landscape remains opaque.

A more alarming development emerged in September 2020, revealing a deeper, more insidious form of control. Two Wikipedia volunteer administrators were arrested on the same day: Osama Khalid was sentenced to a staggering 32 years in prison, while Ziyad al-Sofiani received an eight-year sentence. These arrests were reported by Smex, a Lebanese NGO advocating for self-regulating information societies in the Arab world, and Democracy for the Arab World Now. A subsequent investigation by the Wikimedia Foundation itself uncovered a network of 16 users who appeared to be routinely engaging in conflict-of-interest editing. Crucially, these users were reportedly spying for the Saudi government, feeding information back to authorities and attempting to manipulate content to align with state narratives. This incident exposed a disturbing blend of direct repression and covert digital influence, demonstrating the lengths to which some governments will go to control the flow of information, even within a global, volunteer-driven project. | | Syria | 30 April 2008 – 13 February 2009 | | Arabic | | Yes | Syria, under the Ba'athist regime, has a history of stringent Internet censorship in Ba'athist Syria, and Wikipedia has experienced its share of these restrictions. Notably, access to the Arabic Wikipedia was completely blocked in Syria for a significant period between 30 April 2008 and 13 February 2009. Curiously, during this time, other language editions of Wikipedia remained accessible, suggesting a targeted effort to control information specifically within the Arabic-speaking sphere, perhaps due to its direct relevance to local political and social discourse.

The human cost of online activism and contributing to open-source projects like Wikipedia in Syria is tragically underscored by the case of Bassel Khartabil. Khartabil (باسل خرطبيل in Arabic) was a dedicated contributor to numerous open-source initiatives, including Wikipedia. His arrest in 2012 was widely believed to be directly linked to his online activities and his commitment to free knowledge. In a grim conclusion to his ordeal, he was executed at Adra Prison near Damascus in 2015. His fate serves as a stark reminder of the extreme risks faced by those who champion digital freedom in repressive states. In his honor, several organizations, including the Wikimedia Foundation, established the Bassel Khartabil Free Culture Fellowship in 2017, initially for a period of three years, to continue his legacy of promoting open culture and knowledge. | | Tunisia | 23–27 November 2006 | | All versions | | | The brief, yet significant, blockade of the Wikipedia website in Tunisia between 23 and 27 November 2006 serves as a historical footnote in the country's broader narrative of Internet censorship in Tunisia. While the duration was short, the incident highlighted the Tunisian government's willingness to block access to global information platforms when deemed necessary. This particular block, affecting all versions of Wikipedia, occurred during a period when the government was known for its tight control over online content, frequently filtering websites that contained political criticism, independent news, or content deemed morally objectionable. The swift, albeit temporary, disappearance of Wikipedia from Tunisian screens was a clear demonstration of state authority over the digital realm, a precursor to the greater struggles for freedom of expression that would later characterize the region. | | Turkey | 2014–2015 (partial), April 2017–January 2020 (full) | | All versions | | | Turkey's relationship with Wikipedia has been, to put it mildly, tumultuous, culminating in a protracted, full-site block that garnered international attention, as detailed in the main article Block of Wikipedia in Turkey.

In the early hours of 29 April 2017, the monitoring group Turkey Blocks reported a complete loss of access to all language editions of Wikipedia throughout Turkey. This comprehensive block was initiated after Turkish authorities demanded that Wikipedia "remove content by writers supporting terror and of linking Turkey to terror groups." The government asserted that it had not received a satisfactory response to this demand, leading to the drastic measure.

Prior to this full blockade, Turkey had already engaged in more targeted censorship. Starting on 17 November 2014, specific articles on the Turkish Wikipedia had been censored. Examples included "2015 Türkiye genel seçim anketleri" ("2015 Turkey general election polls") and articles related to reproductive organs. These earlier instances of censorship lacked formal court decisions, leading to confusion and speculation. One Turkish internet provider, TTNET, even suggested that Wikipedia was simply "broken," a claim swiftly refuted by Katherine Maher from the Wikimedia Foundation, who clarified that the issue was indeed censorship.

The 2017 full block, however, dragged on for over two and a half years. It was only in December 2019 that the Constitutional Court of Turkey finally intervened, ruling that the prolonged block was unconstitutional, a significant victory for freedom of information. On 15 January 2020, the Wikimedia Foundation confirmed that access to the website was being restored across Turkey, ending a long period of informational isolation for Turkish users.

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• Turkey blocks Wikipedia, alleging smear campaign | | Uzbekistan | 2007, 2008, 2012 | | All versions | | | Uzbekistan has a history of tight control over information and human rights, including Internet censorship in Human rights in Uzbekistan § Internet. The country experienced two brief, but total, blocks of Wikipedia in 2007 and again in 2008, demonstrating an early willingness by authorities to cut off access to the global encyclopedia.

The censorship of the Uzbek Wikipedia specifically drew international attention in late February 2012. During this period, internet users within Uzbekistan attempting to access Uzbek-language pages found themselves mysteriously redirected to MSN, a clear sign of deliberate interference. Interestingly, users could still easily access Wikipedia articles in other languages, indicating a targeted block solely on the Uzbek-language content. This suggests that the authorities were particularly concerned about information being disseminated in the local language, likely due to its direct relevance to the domestic population.

However, the situation has seen a remarkable turnaround. Today, Uzbek users can access Uzbek-language articles without problems, a notable shift from previous restrictions. In a particularly surprising development in 2022, the Uzbek government even co-hosted the WikiStipendiya article creation editathon in collaboration with the local Uzbek community. This initiative, designed to encourage and support the creation of new content on Uzbek Wikipedia, represents a striking departure from past censorship, suggesting a potential, albeit cautious, embrace of the platform as a tool for national knowledge dissemination rather than a threat to be suppressed. | | Venezuela | 12–18 January 2019 | | All versions | | | The blocking of Wikipedia in Venezuela in early 2019 was a stark indicator of escalating Censorship in Venezuela and tightening governmental control over information, directly coinciding with a period of intense political instability. This incident is further elaborated in the main article Block of Wikipedia in Venezuela.

On the evening of 12 January 2019, NetBlocks, an internet observatory, gathered compelling technical evidence confirming the blocking of all editions of Wikipedia within Venezuela. These restrictions were implemented by CANTV, the nation's largest telecommunications provider in the country, a state-owned entity. NetBlocks identified a major network disruption that affected crucial telecommunications infrastructure, occurring simultaneously with other restrictions that severely hampered Venezuelans' ability to communicate and access information over the preceding 24 hours.

The data collected also revealed that a number of local websites had been recently restricted, strongly suggesting that the recent political instability was the underlying catalyst for what appeared to be a rapidly tightening regime of internet control. Haaretz reported that the block occurred after Nicolás Maduro was "ousted" from an article on Wikipedia, referring to edits that reflected the opposition's view that he was no longer the legitimate president. This incident underscored how quickly a global, open platform could become a battleground for competing political narratives, leading to drastic measures by a government intent on controlling public perception. The block, which lasted for several days, effectively cut off a significant portion of the Venezuelan populace from a critical source of information during a period of national crisis, demonstrating the direct link between political upheaval and digital repression. |

Single-article disputes

Beyond the broad, often clumsy, efforts to block entire platforms, governments and other powerful entities also engage in more targeted skirmishes: the single-article dispute. These battles, while seemingly minor in scale, reveal the granular level at which narratives are contested and suppressed.

Types of disputes

These disputes often arise from a specific kind of digital paranoia, where a single piece of information is deemed too dangerous, too defamatory, or too revealing. The motivations are varied, but the underlying fear of uncontrolled information remains constant. Governments might claim an article reveals the location of a secret military installation (as seen in France), while individuals or corporations might allege defamation or the spread of misinformation (a common theme in Germany and India). Even the subjective judgment that an image in an article is pornographic can trigger a block, as exemplified by a case in the United Kingdom. These instances highlight the vulnerability of open platforms to legal challenges and the sometimes-arbitrary nature of content control.

Examples by country

Australia

In 2018, Australia found itself embroiled in a unique legal challenge to information dissemination. County Court of Victoria chief judge Peter Kidd issued a sweeping non-publication order on all evidence and the verdict in the high-profile trial of Australian Cardinal George Pell. The suppression order was incredibly broad, applying "in all Australian states and territories" and, crucially, "on any website or other electronic or broadcast format accessible within Australia." This explicitly included Wikipedia, which, while cited, was not formally charged or directly ordered to remove content. The order created a peculiar situation where information widely available internationally was legally suppressed within Australia, testing the boundaries of national jurisdiction over global digital content and leaving Australian readers and editors in a challenging position regarding compliance.

France

The incident involving the Pierre-sur-Haute military radio station on the French Wikipedia in April 2013 is a textbook case of the Streisand effect in action, showcasing the futility of clumsy attempts at censorship. This particular episode drew the unwanted attention of the French interior intelligence agency (DCRI), which demanded the article's removal.

The DCRI's approach was, to put it mildly, heavy-handed. They summoned Rémi Mathis, a volunteer administrator of the French Wikipedia and a resident of France, to their offices on 4 April 2013. Under duress, Mathis was coerced into deleting the article. He was explicitly told that he would be held in custody and prosecuted if he did not comply. Despite Mathis explaining that this was not how Wikipedia operates—that content is collaborative and not controlled by a single individual—he had no choice but to comply. He then warned other sysops that attempting to undelete the article would "engage their responsibility before the law." It's worth noting that Mathis had no prior connection to the article, having never edited it and not even being aware of its existence before his summons. He was targeted simply because he was easily identifiable due to his public promotion of Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects in France.

The Wikimedia Foundation attempted to engage with the DCRI, asking which specific parts of the article were problematic. They pointed out that the article's content closely mirrored information from a 2004 documentary produced by Télévision Loire 7, a French local television station, which was freely available online. The DCRI, however, refused to provide these details, simply reiterating their demand for deletion.

The DCRI's clumsy attempt at suppression backfired spectacularly. The article was quickly restored by another Wikipedia contributor who, strategically, lived outside France, in Switzerland. As a direct result of the controversy, the article on the Pierre-sur-Haute military radio station became the most read page on the French Wikipedia, rocketing to over 120,000 page views during the weekend of 6–7 April 2013. It was also rapidly translated into multiple other languages, ensuring its global dissemination. French newspaper 20 minutes, Ars Technica, and a posting on Slashdot all highlighted the incident as a prime example of the Streisand effect, where attempts to hide information only serve to draw more attention to it. The French Ministry of the Interior predictably declined to comment on the incident.

A judicial source, quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP) on 8 April, later clarified that the deletion was part of a "preliminary inquiry" by the "anti-terrorist section of the Paris prosecutor's office." The justification given was that the article compromised "classified material related to the chain of transmission for nuclear launch orders."

Following the debacle, Télévision Loire 7, the source of the original documentary, stated they expected the DCRI to request its removal, despite it having been filmed and broadcast with the full cooperation of the French armed forces. The National Union of Police Commissioners even suggested that the next step would be for the judiciary to order French Internet service providers to block access to the Wikipedia article, a further escalation. However, the France-based NGO Reporters Without Borders sharply criticized the DCRI's actions as "a bad precedent," arguing that if classified information was genuinely compromised, the judiciary should be involved to assess the reality and extent of military secrecy, rather than coercing volunteers. They reiterated that hosts and intermediaries should not be held responsible for information sourced from publicly available, even officially sanctioned, documentaries. The entire episode served as a stark lesson in the counterproductive nature of heavy-handed information control.

Germany

In a notable case in Germany, Wikipedia.de, an internet domain operated by Wikimedia Deutschland, found itself in a legal bind. A temporary injunction was issued, prohibiting the domain from redirecting to the actual Wikipedia content. This legal action was initiated by politician Lutz Heilmann, who took issue with claims made in a Wikipedia article regarding his past involvement with the former German Democratic Republic's intelligence service, the Stasi. The injunction, while not blocking the content itself, effectively severed the most obvious entry point for German users, demonstrating how legal challenges can disrupt access to information even without a direct content deletion order. It was a subtle, yet effective, way to make inconvenient facts harder to find.

India

The Indian legal system once again intervened with Wikipedia content on 21 October 2024. As previously detailed, the Wikimedia Foundation was compelled to suspend access to a specific article on the English Wikipedia that concerned the ongoing defamation lawsuit filed by Asian News International (ANI) against the foundation itself. This action was taken due to an order from the Delhi High Court, which deemed the article in violation of the sub judice principle, essentially prohibiting public discussion of a matter still under judicial review. This marked a significant, albeit temporary, instance of content suppression on the platform in India.

However, the legal trajectory of this dispute saw a definitive change. On 9 May 2025, the Supreme Court of India, acting on an appeal, overturned the Delhi High Court's order that mandated the takedown of the page. The Supreme Court's ruling emphasized the crucial role of a free media in a liberal democracy and asserted that it is not the judiciary's prerogative to instruct media organizations to delete or remove content, even if it is critical of them. This decision led to the restoration of the article, affirming principles of press freedom and open information in the face of legal pressures.

Portugal

Following a court order issued in August 2025 by the Portuguese Supreme Court of Justice, specific sections of the English and Portuguese Wikipedia articles concerning businessman Caesar DePaço were subjected to partial censorship. This action was taken to ensure compliance with the court's decree, highlighting how national legal systems can compel global platforms to modify content based on local judgments, even if it means altering a publicly accessible, collaborative encyclopedia. The specifics of the content removed were not broadly publicized, but the precedent of judicial intervention on a global platform remains.

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom has its own peculiar history with Wikipedia censorship, notably involving the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), a UK-based non-government organization responsible for blacklisting child sexual abuse imagery. This incident is further explored in Internet censorship in the United Kingdom and Internet Watch Foundation and Wikipedia.

In December 2008, the IWF made the rather controversial decision to add the Wikipedia article Virgin Killer to its internet blacklist. The reason? The album cover's image, which depicts a pre-pubescent girl, and the perceived illegality of child pornography in the UK. The IWF had assessed the image as being at the "lowest level of legal concern," categorizing it as "erotic posing with no sexual activity." Despite this nuanced classification, the inclusion on the blacklist had immediate and widespread consequences.

As a direct result, individuals using many major UK ISPs found themselves blocked from viewing the entire article by the Cleanfeed system, a national content blocking system. Even more significantly, a large portion of the UK's internet users were inadvertently blocked from editing any part of Wikipedia. This collateral damage occurred because of the technical means the IWF employed to block the image, which often involved blocking the IP addresses of the servers hosting the content, thereby affecting all users connected through those servers.

The decision sparked a considerable public outcry and extensive discussion. The Wikimedia Foundation made strong representations, and public complaints flooded in. Recognizing the significant overreach and unintended consequences of their action, the IWF reversed their decision three days later. They also provided an assurance that, in the future, they would not block copies of similar images that were hosted overseas, acknowledging the impracticality and censorship implications of such broad-brush blocking. This incident served as a powerful illustration of how well-intentioned censorship efforts can lead to disproportionate restrictions on legitimate content and free expression, even within a country generally considered to have robust freedoms.

See also

For those who find themselves drawn into the rabbit hole of information control, these related articles offer further insights into the complex ecosystem of Wikipedia and its ongoing battles:

• Freedom of speech portal
• Internet portal
• Wikipedia portal
• Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
• Criticism of Wikipedia § Sexual content
• Deletionism and inclusionism in Wikipedia
• Ideological bias on Wikipedia
• Internet censorship § Wikipedia
• List of people imprisoned for editing Wikipedia
• Asian News International vs. Wikimedia Foundation
• Freedom of speech by country