Cuba Reports Misleading Progress in Internet Access and Telecoms Sector

The Cuban government has reported that Cuba currently has 1.6 million internet users, representing 14.2% of the Caribbean island's total population. This has been reported as a sign of progress in the Cuban National Office of Statistics, but evidence suggests that most internet users remain constrained to using only the regime's controlled intranet system. The stark comparison with other Caribbean economies such as the Dominican Republic (with internet access for 25.87% of the population according to the International Telecoms Union—ITU) is evident. According to data from the ITU from 2008, the number of Cubans to have access to telecommunications systems remains one of the lowest in Latin America, with only 15.5 landlines per 100 inhabitants and 800,000 mobile accesses in the entire territory.

The Cuban government has presented its new telecoms statistics as a sign of improvement, but the sector pales in comparison to its Latin American peers. The island continues to be served by a unique telecoms service provider, ETECSA, which offers fixed-line services, including voice and internet, mobile telephony and public payphones. Internet access is still out of reach for most Cubans as computer penetration is still low at 62 computers per 1,000 inhabitants, some 700,000 computers in total, and access to most of them remains restricted to government officials, medic schools and some universities. The regime still maintains tight controls over its use; access to certain Web sites is restricted and citizens can be prosecuted if they use the internet for political activities. Likewise, in the mobile segment, things have not improved much since March 2008, when the government lifted restrictions on mobile phone ownership for ordinary Cubans; until then, the only people legally allowed to have mobile phones were foreigners, Cubans working for foreign companies, and senior Communist Party officials. Mobile services continue to be a luxury for most of the population due the relatively high costs of services and handsets. Cuba continues to blame the United States for its embargo, which stops several internet services from being offered from the United States. So far Cuba has launched a project with Venezuela to create a telecoms cable between both countries but the project is still in the pipeline.

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