In the modern era, cutting off the internet has become a form of state violence. As the world enters 2026, state-sponsored digital blackouts are no longer technical measures or temporary controls; they are deliberate instruments used to expose civilian populations to physical harm, legal erasure, and economic paralysis. When governments disable connectivity during moments of unrest, they are not restoring order, they are manufacturing vulnerability.
From a conservative perspective, such acts violate the most basic purpose of government: to safeguard unalienable rights to life and liberty, not to deliberately place entire populations at risk. International law must now confront this reality by recognizing state-imposed digital blackouts as crimes against humanity, and by enforcing accountability through sovereignty-respecting mechanisms that punish perpetrators rather than collectively punishing civilians.
The Weaponization of Silence
Under the Rome Statute, crimes against humanity require a "widespread or systematic attack" on civilians. Historically, conservatives have condemned the physical "black boxes" of 20th-century regimes, where states stripped away life and accountability behind closed borders. Today, digital blackouts achieve the same isolation by severing the information flows essential to personal security.
The ongoing crisis in Iran provides a chilling case study. Following massive protests that began in late December, the country entered a third day of near-total digital darkness as of early January 2026. Monitoring groups such as NetBlocks report a nationwide outage that coincided with large-scale crackdowns, resulting in thousands of deaths and arrests. By "turning off the lights," the regime in Tehran has created a sanctuary for violence, ensuring that incidents of live-fire in cities like Karaj and Shiraz remain largely hidden from the world.
Similarly, Russia’s systematic expansion of mobile internet shutdowns, reaching dozens of regions by early 2026, demonstrates how claims of "national security" are used to justify information control. While the Kremlin asserts these cuts protect against drone threats, the reality is a paralyzed civilian infrastructure, leaving residents in cities such as St. Petersburg and Rostov-on-Don unable to coordinate safety or document state failures.
The Three Pillars of the Crime
The conservative case for elevating digital blackouts to the level of international crimes is grounded in first principles: the individual right to self‑preservation, family security, and the freedom to pursue livelihood. Internet shutdowns do not merely impede communication; they systematically dismantle these essential rights across three distinct pillars.
First: Obstruction of Life‑Saving Services. Modern healthcare systems and emergency services increasingly depend on digital connectivity for triage, ambulance dispatch, patient records, remote consultations, and real‑time coordination. When a state imposes a blackout, these lifelines are severed. Hospitals, clinicians, and emergency responders lose access to critical information, and patients are cut off from calling for help or receiving timely care. Studies have shown that shutdowns directly impede access to medical and emergency services as health systems grow ever more reliant on digital tools.
Second: Destruction of Evidence and Impunity. Documentation is the bedrock of accountability. Internet access allows civilians, journalists, and human rights defenders to record abuses, share evidence, and alert the world. United Nations human‑rights observers have noted that disruptions in connectivity “undermine the work of those documenting violations” and limit the ability to share lifesaving information. By disabling cameras, messaging and reporting channels, a regime does more than silence dissent, it creates conditions where abuses can be hidden from scrutiny, entrenching impunity.
Third: Economic Paralysis Through Deprivation. Free enterprise and property rights cannot function in a vacuum of connectivity. Internet shutdowns exact steep economic costs by halting commercial transactions, freezing banking and digital payments, and disrupting markets and supply chains. Analysis of past shutdowns found that global outages have cost economies billions of dollars, with losses extending far beyond short interruptions. For families and small businesses that rely on digital banking, online marketplaces, and remote work, shutdowns translate into immediate loss of income, savings, and economic agency, a form of deprivation that undermines livelihoods at scale.
A Turning Point
The international community is beginning to respond to this conservative call for accountability. In December 2025, the International Criminal Court (ICC) released a landmark policy on "Cyber-Enabled Crimes," explicitly recognizing that digital tools, including internet shutdowns, can constitute elements of crimes against humanity when used to facilitate persecution or conceal atrocities.
Additionally, as the United Nations convenes its Preparatory Committee sessions in January 2026 for a new Crimes Against Humanity Treaty, there is a historic opportunity to codify the so-called "Digital Kill Switch" as a prohibited form of state violence. Rather than relying solely on slow-moving multilateral mechanisms, conservatives argue for a strategy of "Justice through Strength": imposing targeted sanctions on officials complicit in digital repression and deploying decentralized satellite networks, such as Starlink, to circumvent the monopolies that enable tyrannical shutdowns.
From Access to Survival
In 2026, connectivity is no longer a convenience, it is survival infrastructure. When regimes cut off the internet, from Tehran’s crackdown on protesters to Moscow’s drone-pretext shutdowns, they are not preserving order; they are locking civilians into a state of manufactured vulnerability.
Treating these blackouts as mere technical glitches only emboldens tyrants. By recognizing digital shutdowns as crimes against humanity, the world can reaffirm government’s true purpose: protecting life, liberty, and security. The mandate is clear: no state should ever wield the power to silence its people into a grave.
