to interact socially and for more critical
conversations.
On the broadcasting front, national
commercial radio station, Star FM, in
October launched its mobile application allowing functionalities of live
streaming, play or pause, of their live
broadcasts.

Threats to free expression online
While legal and, in some instances,
extra-legal hindrances continue to hinder freedom of expression and access to
information, especially through the traditional means of communication, the
internet has remained a relatively freer
space for information diffusion, dialogue
and debate, providing an opportunity
for Zimbabweans to participate in that
space. Their participation is reflected
in various newspaper websites, online
news agencies and various social media
platforms on which Zimbabweans robustly debate issues and propagate their
views however critical of the state.
However, the internet is not completely
secure since laws that are used to regulate and control expression offline can
still be used to regulate online activity. This was the situation in the case
of councillor for the opposition political party, the MDC-T, Nduna Matshazi
who was arrested in October for allegedly posting a derogatory message on a
Whatsapp chat group insulting President
Mugabe. The councillor was later suspended.
The government worked on bills to control cyberspace, notably the Data Protection Bill, Electronic Transaction and
Electronic Commerce Bill and the Computer Crime and Cyber Crime Bills. The
proposed legislative measures would
give government greater control of cyber space.

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The Electronic Transaction and Electronic Commerce Bill intends to promote legal certainty and enforce ability
to electronic transactions and electronic
commerce. It also aims to grant legal
recognition to electronic communications and writing and would also provide for the legal effect of electronic
signatures as well as secure electronic
signatures.
The Data Protection Bill will govern the
processing of personal information by
private and public bodies to prevent unauthorised and arbitrary use, collection,
processing, transmission and storage of
data of identifiable persons.
The Computer Crime and Cyber Crime
Bills, if passed, will allow government
to remotely install forensic spying tools
onto citizens’ communication devices.
A remote forensic tool is defined in the
draft Bill as an “investigative tool, including software or hardware installed
on or in relation to a computer system
or part of a computer system and used
to perform tasks that include, but are not
limited to keystroke logging or transmission of an IP address”.

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