According to the folks I know who’ve researched this, governments like people to be conveniently located, say, in cities. They like people to be dependent upon convenient food and energy sources, say, grocery stores and on the power grid. They like people to be unarmed, and preferably not self-sufficient.
Tyrannical governments absolutely hate people who can survive in a rural environment, growing and killing (hunting and raising livestock) their own food, who can survive off the grid, and are well armed.
It’s easier to starve and machine gun down the populace in the cities, not so easy in the boonies. Under tyrannical rule, the city becomes a prison, and its inhabitants easily maintained. Trouble makers are simply killed or spirited away.
I could survive in the boonies, with my weapons, my hunting skills, my survivalist skills, and althought I wouldn’t have the internet in my cave, I would be safe from being gunned down in the street by soldiers loyal to the tyrant. At least until I ran out of ammo. no, I am not one of those survivalist nuts that you read about, but I do know a bit about how those people think.
John Varley wrote a great story about how the Internet could be used against the citizens of a country like the US. Its called Press Enter. If you get a chance to read it, check it out, it will make you see the Internet and computers in a whole new light. You might even stop Fluthering.