Iran’s Internet Connectivity Partially Restored, But Experts Warn Outlook Remains Bleak
Iran’s internet connectivity has been partially restored, but experts are warning that, even on the other side of the digital blackout, the outlook for Iranian internet access remains bleak. Internet monitoring experts at NetBlocks and Kentik said that some traffic resumed on Tuesday – nearly 20 days after the Iranian government cut the internet and international calls as it sought to crush massive anti-government protests. Thousands of demonstrators were killed in the crackdown.
Regime Moves Toward Digital Isolation
In the meantime, the Iranian regime has made progress on its long-standing plans to “retire” access to the international internet, according to digital monitoring experts. They warn that Iran is entering “a new age of digital isolation.”
“Every time we have an internet shutdown in Iran, usually we don’t go back to normal,” said Amir Rashidi, a cybersecurity expert and the director of digital rights and security at the Miaan Group, a nonprofit that supports human rights in Iran.
After previous internet shutdowns, some platforms never returned. Instagram was blocked after the internet shutdown in 2022, amid widespread protests following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody. And the popular messaging app Telegram was banned following protests in 2018.
Whitelisting: A Shift in Censorship Strategy
Now, the Iranian government has made strides toward more broadly implementing technology that allows only people with security clearance to access the international web, Rashidi told CNN. Experts call it “whitelisting,” and it involves a small subset of users being cleared to have a cell phone SIM card or other permissions that allow unrestricted access to the outside internet. Everyone else is effectively censored and forced to rely on the country’s national internet, where the regime can track users and block unapproved websites.
Such whitelisting is a move away from the country’s longstanding tactic of blacklisting specific websites and apps, toward a policy of keeping large swathes of Iranians perpetually in the dark, Rashidi explained.
Uncertain Recovery and Persistent Filters
Since partial connectivity was restored on Tuesday, internet traffic patterns have been very jagged, according to the director of internet analysis at Kentik, Doug Madory. He speculated that “maybe a new traffic filtering system has been installed and can’t keep up.”
“Most ordinary users still face heavy filtering and intermittent service under a whitelist system despite a significant increase in internationally visible networks and datacenters,” NetBlocks noted on Wednesday.
Rashidi said of the expanding whitelisting policy, citing Miaan’s analysis of hacked emails that revealed some of the Iranian judiciary’s potential plans for censorship: “We do believe they’re going to rapidly move into the direction of implementing that policy… the infrastructure exists.”
“I think the future is much darker,” Rashidi told CNN, noting that he also expects to see more military control and surveillance of the internet in the future.
Internet censorship has become a cat-and-mouse game.
