Vietnam blocks dissident sites, rights groups and Vietnamese-language news from abroad, ordered Telegram blocked in June 2025, and presses Facebook and Google to delete posts it calls anti-state.
Every day we open 67 of the world’s biggest sites and apps from home internet connections in Vietnam, and record what’s blocked, since when and how.
6 of 67 testedsites and apps with a confirmed block in Vietnam
67 of 67 results confirmed in the last 48 hours.
Tests are requested on Viettel and FPT Telecom home connections. 2 of them on only some networks.
Vietnam’s main telecoms operators are state-controlled: Viettel by the military, VNPT by the finance ministry and, since February 2025, MobiFone by the Ministry of Public Security. Providers carry out censorship themselves, putting listed URLs on blacklists; some tell users a site has been blocked, others show an ordinary-looking error. The information ministry said it had blocked more than 10,000 fraudulent or law-breaking domains by March 2024.
The best-known blocks are political. Freedom House says websites critical of the government, such as Báo Tiếng Dân and Văn Việt, are generally unreachable, as are the Vietnamese-language services of the BBC, Radio Free Asia and Voice of America and the sites of Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders. Facebook and Google are pressed to censor instead: in April 2020, after the authorities slowed its traffic, Facebook agreed to restrict far more “anti-state” posts.
Decree 147, in force since December 2024 in place of Decree 72, makes platforms confirm users’ identities with a Vietnamese mobile number or official documents, and keep users’ data and hand it to the authorities. Games need a licence too: Steam was blocked in May 2024 after ignoring requests over unlicensed games, while Roblox is offered through VNG, its licensed local publisher.
In 2025 the authorities blocked Telegram. On 23 May the telecoms authority, part of the Ministry of Science and Technology, ordered providers to block it from 2 June, after the Ministry of Public Security said 68% of its 9,600 Vietnamese channels and groups broke laws on fraud, drug trafficking, terrorism or anti-state material. An official said Telegram had failed to remove illegal content or share user data in investigations. Our daily test of telegram.org, the website, still finds it opening on Viettel and FPT: the block may target the app, or work only through the providers’ own name lookup, which many test machines don’t use.
VPNs in Vietnam
Freedom House says tools for getting around censorship are well known among younger, tech-savvy internet users in Vietnam.
Key dates
Internet providers block Telegram, on an order of 23 May issued after the Ministry of Public Security said most of its Vietnamese channels and groups broke the law.
The Ministry of Public Security takes control of MobiFone, Vietnam’s third-largest mobile operator.
Decree 147 replaces Decree 72, making platforms confirm users’ identities with a Vietnamese mobile number or official documents.
Providers block Steam after it ignores the authorities’ requests over unlicensed games.
Facebook agrees to restrict far more “anti-state” posts, after the authorities deliberately slowed its traffic in Vietnam.
Get past a block
Blocked in Vietnam?
A VPN connects you through a server in another country, so the blocks in Vietnam no longer apply. Where VPNs themselves are blocked, you need one that can disguise its traffic.
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Test machines on Viettel and FPT Telecom home connections open each site’s homepage every day.
A failure counts only when it happens twice on the same network, while the site opens from other countries.
A change is published only after re-checks a few hours later and again the next day, on several machines per provider, confirm it. It’s dated from the first sighting.
Test machines caught getting around blocks, through a VPN or a filter-dodging tool, are set aside.
We test websites, mostly over home broadband. Apps, calls and mobile networks can behave differently.
The Ministry of Public Security said 68% of the 9,600 Telegram channels and groups in Vietnam broke laws on fraud, drug trafficking, terrorism and anti-government material, and an official said Telegram failed to remove illegal content or share user data in criminal investigations. Providers blocked it from 2 June 2025.
Is Facebook Blocked in Vietnam?
Freedom House found no social media platform blocked between June 2023 and May 2024; instead, Facebook censors posts for the government. In April 2020, after the authorities slowed its traffic, it agreed to significantly increase its compliance with requests to restrict “anti-state” posts, and the information minister said it met 95% of them.
Do You Need a Vietnamese Phone Number to Use Social Media?
Not necessarily. Decree 147, in force since December 2024, makes platforms confirm users’ identities with either a local mobile number or official documents, and keep users’ data and hand it to the authorities.
