TechCabal reported on 12 October 2026 that millions of Africans live within reach of a mobile signal yet stay offline, naming Egypt, Ghana and Niger among its cases. We could not retrieve the article (HTTP 403), so we have not read its Egypt-specific figures. The question it raises is still worth asking. Does a legal environment in which ordinary online expression can become a criminal offence suppress usage in a way that network build-out cannot fix?
The strongest case for the law
Egypt's government has real problems to solve. Cabinet ministers have described online blackmail targeting children, and the National Council for Childhood and Motherhood said it had received several complaints of it, according to a Cairo governorate government news item dated 3 February 2026. Fraud through online betting apps is rising, according to the MP leading parliament's IT committee. A state facing extortion, fraud and child-safety harms is entitled to legislate. Law 175 of 2018 on Anti-Cyber and Information Technology Crimes also contains conventional provisions that most readers would not object to.
The problem is Article 25
The difficulty is not that Egypt regulates online conduct. It is how Article 25 does so. According to Human Rights Watch, people charged under it face six months to three years in prison plus fines for "violating family principles or values in Egyptian society". The law gives no list of those values and does not define the conduct it criminalises. Egypt's Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression prints the article's text and argues for its repeal.
That vagueness is not hypothetical. HRW, citing Interior Ministry statements, counted at least 29 people arrested or prosecuted over online content between late July and late August 2025, including at least 19 women and a child. On 8 August 2025 the public prosecution confirmed charges against 10 content creators. Eight were ordered held in pretrial detention, and all 10 had their assets frozen and were banned from travel. Charges ranged from family values to public morals and money laundering, and the targets included belly dancers and tattoo artists.
The constitutional challenge is live. According to Al-Ain, a case (No. 12217 of judicial year 80) before the Administrative Judiciary Court argues that the phrase "any of the family principles or values" in Article 25 is too vague. A verdict is set for 28 October 2026.
More criminal law is coming
The pending 2026 amendments broaden the surface area further. Egyptian Streets reported on 27 May 2026, citing MP Ahmed Badawi, that the government was expected to submit cybercrime amendments after Eid al-Adha. They would criminalise online betting apps, with penalties that could reach life imprisonment in organised, large-scale fraud cases. They would also widen provisions on cyber extortion and false information, including rumours intended to create "a climate of despair". We found no report confirming that the amendments or the children's social media bill have passed.
Criminalising betting apps and punishing organised fraud is proportionate. Penalising "despair" is not. A standard that depends on the mood a post produces is one that no ordinary user can predict, and unpredictability is what chills speech.
What the usage data does and does not show
Here the honest answer is more complicated than the hook suggests. Africa-wide, about 36% of people used the internet in 2025, versus a global rate of 74%, according to the TechCabal analysis. Egypt is far above that continental figure. DataReportal reports 98.2 million internet users in October 2025, or 82.7% of the population, based on Kepios estimates.
So Egypt is not obviously a case where fear keeps people offline. Its usage gap, if it exists, is probably shaped mostly by cost, device access, literacy and gender. We have no evidence that Article 25 suppresses connection itself. Anyone claiming a causal link between the cybercrime law and non-adoption is going beyond the data.
The more defensible claim is narrower. The law shapes how people use the internet, not whether they connect. A creator who learns that dance videos, tattoo studios or a teenager's TikTok can trigger asset freezes and travel bans has a rational reason to stop publishing. Egyptians are online in large numbers, but the cost of being a visible, creative participant has been raised. That matters for an economy that wants a domestic creator and digital-services sector.
A proportionate alternative
Egypt can address real harms without open-ended offences:
- Define the conduct. Replace "family values" with specific harms that already exist in law: non-consensual intimate imagery, extortion, child exploitation, fraud.
- Limit pretrial measures. Asset freezes and travel bans should require individual judicial findings, not bulk charging.
- Test the children's bill against evidence. Age verification and parental controls, proposed by the Deputy Prime Minister in February 2026, can protect children, but they should be designed to avoid centralised identity collection.
- Drop the rumour offence. Existing defamation and fraud law covers deliberate falsehoods that cause concrete harm.
The 28 October ruling is the next real test. If the court finds the phrase too vague, Egypt gets a chance to rewrite the offence precisely. If not, the pending amendments will land on top of a statute that already lets prosecutors define the offence themselves.