Sri Lanka's president yesterday ordered the "immediate" lifting of the country-wide social media ban which was imposed 10 days ago in the aftermath of the Easter Sunday bombings. The Sri Lankan government has urged the general public to be responsible while sharing information on social media. Internet monitoring site Netblocks.org confirmed that access to all services was fully restored yesterday; access first returned on leading internet providers including Dialog Axiata, Sri Lanka Telecom, and Mobitel, followed by others. Update: Access to social media and messaging apps is now almost completely restored across #SriLanka, following a gradual return that took two hours to complete after the blockade was first lifted this morning ??https://t.co/CCNd4xONl2 pic.twitter.com/M3Scd3nFVQ — NetBlocks.org (@netblocks) April 30, 2019 The government confirmed that Facebook, WhatsApp, Viber, and YouTube were banned "taking into consideration the security concerns which remained high" after the attacks which resulted in the death of an estimated 290 people. The ban was brought in as “false news reports were spreading through social media”; it said the blockage will be in effect until investigations into the attack concluded. Some notes on the social media ban 1. The government was going to lift it on the sixth day: On the sixth day of the ban, some internet providers in Sri Lanka briefly lifted the ban and reinstated it. According to Netblocks, the president changed his mind about ending the temporary ban and considered banning the platforms permanently. MediaNama cannot confirm this independently. "We were planning to lift the Social…
