Iran’s private internet: nation looks to control what citizens can see – The Verge

Iranian hacker group targeted US defense companies

2014-05-13T11:34:18-04:00

Iran's hackers are stepping up their game, according to a new report from security researchers at FireEye. Earlier this year, an Iranian hacking group called Ajax Security Team targeted US defense contractors at an IEEE aerospace convention, using spear phishing emails to plant keylogging malware on unwitting victims' computers. If the contractors took the bait, installing the phony "proxy" program that was actually Ajax malware, the program would log keystrokes, take periodic screenshots, and automatically extract logins and passwords from browsers and chat programs. Ajax also targeted Iranians trying to bypass the country's oppressive web …

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Iran’s president tweets with Jack Dorsey, hints at reversing Twitter ban

2013-10-02T01:49:53-04:00

Iran President Hassan Rouhani (via president.ir)

The people of Iran are blocked from using Twitter and other social networking websites, although Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is one of the few exceptions to that rule. This situation could change however. On Tuesday, Rouhani hinted in tweets traded with Twitter's chairman and co-founder Jack Dorsey that his country's social media ban could eventually ease up.

@HassanRouhani Good evening, President. Are citizens of Iran able to read your tweets?
- Jack Dorsey (@jack) October 1, 2013

@HassanRouhani thank you. Please let us know how we can help to make it a reality.
- Jack Dorsey (@jack) October 1, 2013

Rouhani, who has been president for …

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Iran blames technical glitch for Facebook and Twitter access

2013-09-17T06:47:30-04:00

facebook app icon

Internet users in Iran were surprised when Facebook and Twitter suddenly became accessible for the first time in four years this week, but the government says the move wasn't intentional. On Tuesday, officials said a technical glitch is to blame for the apparent reversal of Iran's ban on social media, dispelling speculation that the government may be easing web restrictions under the leadership of President Hassan Rouhani.

Abdolsamad Khoramabadi, secretary of a government agency on web regulation, says the glitch appears to have arisen from one of Iran's internet service providers (ISPs), and that officials are looking into the matter. Acco …

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Iran appears to loosen restrictions on Facebook and Twitter

2013-09-16T16:54:29-04:00

Iranian Flag (Flickr)

After four years of intricate and widespread filtering, Iran today loosened restrictions on both Facebook and Twitter, allowing open access to the servers. Previously, the services had only been accessible using a VPN or redirecting service outside the country, and many on Twitter commented this was the first time they had ever used the sites without an intermediary. Both Facebook and Twitter have been blocked since the election protests of 2009, when activists used the services as tools for organizing rallies.

The government has yet to make an official statement on the lifted blocks, leading some to speculate that the lapse in filtering is …

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Iran will provide state-run email addresses to all citizens

2013-07-08T17:07:29-04:00

Iranian Flag (Flickr)

Iran is creating the building blocks of a state-controlled internet, and its next major effort appears to be email. Reuters reports that Iran is planning to dole out a government-run email address to each of its citizens and to use the addresses as a way to communicate with them. While that would give the Iranian government a fairly progressive means of communicating with its people, the continued worry is that the state will only use it as another way of monitoring their private lives. Iran is promising to maintain privacy within the service, though full details haven't been revealed.

Reuters reports that data centers are now being set up …

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US removes sanctions on computer exports to Iran ahead of next month’s elections

2013-05-30T20:38:16-04:00

Iranian Flag (Flickr)

The US government is lifting a ban on the export of electronic devices like computers, cellphones, and wireless routers to Iran. Al Jazeera reports that the decision is aimed at strengthening communication and avoiding government internet controls ahead of next month's presidential elections. According to a Treasury Department press release, the general license authorizes exports of equipment to individuals, but not to the Iranian government, or "to any individual or entity on the Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list."

It also enables the sale of "consumer-grade" internet connectivity services

The license applies not only to communicati …

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World Wide [Redacted]: inside Iran’s private internet

2013-04-24T09:30:01-04:00

mehr iran stock 1020

For years, the leadership in Iran has been threatening to build its own private, state-controlled internet, but in recent months, we've started to see what that looks like in practice. Since March, the regime has led crackdowns on any technology that might threaten its control of the online space, pulling the plug on outgoing VPN connections, throttling encrypted traffic nationwide and blocking the Tor bridges that would help Iranians escape onto the global web. It's a broadside attack on the open internet, and a test of every tool in the cypherpunk arsenal.

"Why would you go to Youtube.com when you can go to YouTube.ir?"

It's a cut-rate ver …

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Iran looks to eliminate ‘illegal’ VPNs that help citizens evade internet filters

2013-03-10T16:15:06-04:00

Flickr Iran flag

In a bid to increase oversight of web usage among its citizens, Iran is reportedly clamping down on Encrypted Virtual Private Network (VPN) systems. According to Reuters, Iranian web users are reporting that various VPNs - which normally help evade the government's draconian internet filters - are no longer accessible. Ramezanali Sobhani-Fard, who leads parliament's information and communications technology committee, has confirmed that the regime is currently weeding out unauthorized VPNs. "Within the last few days illegal VPN ports in the country have been blocked," he told a local news agency. "Only legal and registered VPNs can from now …

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Iran reportedly creating software to allow controlled access to social networks

2013-01-06T12:09:03-05:00

Flickr Iran flag

According to local media, Iran's latest effort to control internet access would reportedly give citizens "restricted and controlled" access to prohibited social networking sites, the AFP reports. Iran has had an uneasy relationship with the web, especially as political tension between it and the United States government has widened; the country's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a fatwa outlawing anti-filtering tools that help citizens access blocked material on the internet in May, and the country has reportedly been working on a government-run network that would operate "largely isolated" from the rest of the internet, fearing …

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Iran launches Mehr, an alternative to ‘inappropriate’ YouTube

2012-12-09T20:17:54-05:00

mehr iran stock 1020

With YouTube having been deemed inappropriate by Iran's theocratic regime in 2009, the country is now launching an alternative site, called Mehr (meaning "affection"), that lets users upload and view content they create, and watch videos produced by the national broadcaster, IRIB. According to AFP, the site's About Us page states its aims are to lure Persian-speaking users and advance Iranian culture.

Sites like YouTube and Facebook have been censored in Iran since a hotly-contested 2009 election that saw current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad defeat moderate rival Mir Hossein Mousavi. More recently, the country has been ratcheting up contro …

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