By Published On: February 26, 2022Categories: NEWS
Talk about internet

Under the guise of “managing internal and foreign traffic,” a draft of the Cyberspace Consumers Rights Protection bill would place even more restrictions on Iranian users’ access to internet services.

 

There have been multiple complaints in recent weeks of Iran’s internet speed plummeting, causing huge disruptions in the daily lives of millions of Iranians. The regime’s Minister of Information and Communications Technology characterized the situation as a legacy of the previous administration’s infrastructural issues. However, some technical analysts and even some state-run media are claiming that the slowing internet is an intentional throttling carried out as part of the “Cyberspace Users Rights Protection” plan, an internet censorship bill that has been circulating in recent months.

Social media and messaging platforms, news websites, and other internet services are already subject to harsh restrictions by Iran’s authorities. Under the guise of “managing internal and foreign traffic,” a draft of the Cyberspace Consumers Rights Protection bill would place even more restrictions on Iranian users’ access to internet services. The regime would hold any internet provider in Iran to the norms set by the Supreme Council of Cyberspace, the government organization in charge of overseeing and enforcing internet censorship.

The bill allows the government to compel foreign social media businesses to hand over user data to regime officials, transfer servers to Iran, or allow the regime to unencrypt and monitor user communications through other means. The bill also directs the Ministry of Communication to block all virtual private networks (VPNs) and other censorship-eluding tools, as well as impose jail and financial penalties on users who use them.

 

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Ali Khamenei, the regime’s supreme leader, recently complained about the internet’s “unregulated status” and asked for additional limitations on the free movement of information in and out of Iran in a speech.

 

The regime is increasingly concerned about the role of messaging and social media platforms in helping demonstrators and dissidents connect and organize, hence the rising interest in restricting internet access. Throughout Iran’s biggest rebellion in four decades, millions of letters, photographs, and video reports were transmitted on social media during the November 2019 rallies, keeping the rest of the world updated.

Ali Khamenei, the regime’s supreme leader, recently complained about the internet’s “unregulated status” and asked for additional limitations on the free movement of information in and out of Iran in a speech. The major purpose here is to lay the stage for cracking down on protests and limiting the Iranian opposition’s rising prominence.

Following widespread protests in 2009, the authorities blocked access to key social media platforms including as Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. Many more sites, on the other hand, have found their way into the hands of Iranian consumers since then. In Iran, Instagram and Telegram are two of the most popular apps. Despite the regime’s recent ban on Telegram, millions of Iranians continue to use it on a daily basis.

 

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The state’s aim for total internet control has run across several major roadblocks, causing internal splits among regime officials and factions.

 

To begin with, the regime’s international social media and messaging platforms are based in nations where digital privacy is one of every citizen’s fundamental rights. And, while some tech companies go out of their way to ignore their core values in the name of profit, the Iranian market offers no such incentives: it is riddled with corruption, insecurity, and the threat of international sanctions as a result of the regime’s belligerent activities, money laundering practices, and the nuclear standoff.

Second, the regime’s efforts to replace international services with domestic applications lack substance. The dictatorship will not be able to roll out and sustain such apps at the scale of tens of millions of users due to Iran’s weak digital infrastructure and the highest high use of internet services among Iranians.

Finally, Iran’s economy is on the verge of collapsing completely. People from all walks of life are taking to the streets on a daily basis to protest inflation, high prices, unemployment, and other economic issues. An alteration of internet access will exacerbate economic problems, leading to more of the same protests that the dictatorship is attempting to prevent.

 

A subcommittee of the Majlis (parliament) has approved a bill to restrict internet access in Iran The “Cyberspace Users Rights Protection” bill will soon be delivered to the government for execution.

 

 

 

MEK Iran (follow us on Twitter and Facebook), Maryam Rajavi’s on her siteTwitter & Facebook, NCRI  (Twitter & Facebook) and People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran – MEK IRAN – YouTube

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