Iraq Imposes 90-Minute Internet Shutdowns 3 Times for Exams in Q2 2026

1 articles · Updated · The Cloudflare Blog · Jul 29

Cloudflare said Iraq ordered three nationwide Internet shutdowns on June 2, June 11 and June 28, each lasting about 90 minutes during national exams.
The outages were timed to exam hours to deter cheating, making them a policy-driven disruption rather than a technical failure.
Sudan used the same tactic even more often, imposing 10 shutdowns between April 13 and 23, each lasting roughly 3.5 hours.
The exam blackouts sat alongside other Q2 disruptions tracked by Cloudflare, including Iran’s recovery from an 88-day blackout and infrastructure failures from storms, earthquakes, cable cuts and DNSSEC errors.