Tehran, Iran – A new regulatory directive from Iran’s top internet regulator shows how authorities hope to steer Iranians away from foreign platforms and towards local ones.
Iran’s top internet decision-making body issued a directive earlier this week setting out new rules that could have broad implications for the country’s already restricted internet landscape, which it said had been endorsed by Supreme Leader Ali Husseini. Khamenei’s approval.
The Supreme Council of Cyberspace (SCC) claims that the use of “tools that undermine sophistication” is now “prohibited” unless the user obtains legal permission.
This is the new term proposed by the Iranian authorities for virtual private networks (VPNs), an online privacy tool that masks a user’s IP (Internet Protocol) and is frequently used by most Iranians to circumvent strict internet restrictions.
All major social media platforms including Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and Telegram are banned in Iran, but like thousands of websites they remain popular with tens of millions of users, prompting users to resort to circumvention tools over the years.
Iran will make the purchase and sale of VPNs illegal in 2022, but news that their use will be banned even if not involved in any commercial transactions has sparked a backlash online.
Many point out that the vast majority of Iranians have no choice but to use them if they want to access free internet, so making the use of VPNs illegal would effectively include the majority of the country’s population.
A day after the riots, SCC Secretary Mohammad Amin Aghamiri told state television that the regulations did not include the public and only targeted the highest state entities – the Office of the Supreme Leader, the Presidential Palace, the Judiciary and Parliament etc.
Exclude foreign platforms
But regardless of who is covered by the VPN ban, the SCC directive contains other provisions that require wholesale changes to Iran’s internet landscape.
First, it asked the Ministry of Culture, in collaboration with the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Information and Communications Technology, to develop a plan within a month to incentivize content creators and businesses active on foreign platforms to “strictly stay on local platforms.” Goal: Bring at least half of your target audience to the local platform within six months.
What this effectively means is that the SCC wants much of the content created by people in Iran on popular platforms like Instagram and YouTube to be moved to local platforms. It’s unclear how the government expects to achieve this goal within months.
The directive claims that “any advertising published by legal entities on foreign platforms is illegal” and requires the Ministry of Culture, state television, law enforcement, the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Justice to monitor this and report on it quarterly.
Additionally, the Ministry of Information and Communications Technology is tasked with providing “comprehensive and essential government services” “exclusively” on local platforms and to have at least two services ready within six months.
Some of this work has been ongoing for several years.
The Iranian government has been working to build a “national information network,” requiring websites and services to place their servers within Iran, limiting some government services to local platforms, and making global internet traffic twice as costly as local traffic to incentivize usage. local platform. Serve.
Unblocking the “shell” of foreign platforms
Another part of the SCC directive could also have a significant impact on how social media platforms are used in Iran.
It stipulates that authorities must provide technical capabilities that enable Iranians to obtain “useful foreign services” in a “governable format.”
It is said that this may include negotiations with foreign platforms to establish representative offices in Iran, in addition to an “access window” for local platforms, and a “shell” for foreign platforms that will not be blocked like the main version.
Foreign companies operating social media platforms have yet to agree to have representatives in Iran (which would be accountable to the Iranian government), and major brands such as US-based Meta have also expressed disinterest.
As for the so-called shells, Iranians have experienced them before and suffered privacy violations as a result.
In 2018, Iran blocked the popular messaging app Telegram for allegedly inciting and contributing to “riots” during protests and riots, and Iranians began using unfiltered shells of the app.
Iran also experienced an almost complete internet blackout that lasted for nearly a week during November 2019 protests, which began after the government significantly increased gasoline prices.
These shells will allow unblocked access, but user data passed through them will be accessible before reaching the original application’s server. This puts millions of Iranians at risk of data breaches and fraud before people realize the danger.
Now, the Iranian government wants to officially recognize such shells, essentially inviting people to use them instead of remaining blocked as a major app.
Internet restrictions in Iran reached new levels after nationwide protests began in September 2022 following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody.