The insatiable thirst to control Iran’s communication arteries should be sought in the years of the miracle presidency of the third millennium. At a time when, in the form of the largest and most marginal privatization in the country’s history, the Iranian Telecommunications Company was handed over to military and security institutions (Etimad Mobeen Consortium) so that the key to communications would not remain in the hands of the government. Part of de-reform engineering and limiting people’s choices. Those days, the designers of this handover thought that by taking over the largest operator and owner of physical infrastructure, they had taken the pulse of society’s information forever. But over time, the rapid development of the Internet, the changing generation of mobile networks and the emergence of new interactive platforms made them realize a strategic error: handing over to one or more companies was not enough to fully control the Internet and curb the free flow of information in the digital age.
Society had found its way, and new means of communication rendered physical monopoly ineffective. They realized this fact when the supporters of Hassan Rouhani in the election campaign of 2013, by relying on Telegram, neutralized the orientation of radio and television towards the fundamentalist candidate. Rouhani became the president and the constructive experience of the JCPOA kept the fundamentalists away from the government for another four years. But they did not sit idle. The principled rained men, from that time on, switched on “protection” and tried to restrict the virtual space during Hassan Rouhani’s era, so that the skirt of their desired candidate in the 1400 election would be free from the dirty stain of filtering. They were able to filter Telegram by adhering to the verdict of a judge (who was later convicted for corruption) and disrupted the community’s access to this media, which had a large audience among the general public.
Since then, there have been rumblings of a complete removal of the government from broadband and internet management. At first, they had the idea to remove the “Infrastructure Communications Company”, which is the main gateway to the country’s Internet, from the government and hand it over to governing institutions outside the scope of public supervision. But very soon they realized that controlling the sources of Internet entry, without having the authority to regulate and legislate, is useless and faces the resistance of the expert body. This is where the strategy changed: the government should not be eliminated, but transformed and disempowered in the new structure.
The “Protection Plan for Users’ Rights in Cyber ​​Space” was formulated during the presidency of Ebrahim Raisi and the 11th Parliament, when power was so-called unified: with the aim of strict control of the Internet, limiting foreign platforms and authenticating users. This plan, which was one of the most inflammatory legislative cases in Iran, went through ups and downs; It provoked public anger and triggered a wave of protest from digital businesses, experts and the opposition of some long-standing figures in governance, and finally reached a deadlock in the parliament; But the contents of that lamp off were followed up by the Supreme Council of Cyberspace; Until now, this malignant tumor has returned.
The “systematization of cyberspace” plan, which is the same protection plan with a new and improved mask, completes exactly this puzzle. The ultimate goal is for the Ministry of Communications to be reduced from a policy-making and accountable institution to a closed-eye operator and unquestioning executor of the orders of the Supreme Council of Cyber ​​Space. In this new architecture, the National Center of Cyberspace is removed from the policy position and becomes an operational and security headquarters that assigns tasks to even the smallest functions of platforms and users.
The implementation of this divisive plan accelerated in Bezengah after the 40-day war. When the elected body (executive power) and appointed bodies faced each other in connecting the Internet. Internet outages in the days after the war became so popular that it became an excuse for a pro business. The usual routes to bring the Internet back to the people did not work. Therefore, the president ordered his first deputy to re-open the country’s internet by forming a special council. This decision was a wake-up call for the extremists. By media attacks and questioning the legitimacy of this council, they clearly showed that in the geometry of their desired power, the president and the government do not have the right to interfere in the communication arteries and cannot play the role of savior because the final decision-makers of connecting and disconnecting the Internet are other institutions that are not accountable to the people in any election.
The output of this monopolistic thinking is pushing the country towards a “digital North Korea” model. A dark model in which some people with unfiltered white lines consider themselves the guardians and undisputed owners of the country’s resources and in the dark room of their thoughts decide to limit the access of tens of millions of ordinary citizens. This purely security view will slaughter the digital economy, which is the only hope for young people and entrepreneurs in difficult economic conditions. Heavy and devastating fines, depriving investment security and unregulated blockades, not only do not stop cultural influence, but also lead the country’s human and financial capital to migrate and leave the borders.
But the bitter truth is that the designers of this digital fence ignore the obvious facts. While spending hours in the corridors of parliament for filtering, mandatory authentication and controlling gateways, they write laws while the world is crossing physical borders and terrestrial internet at a breakneck speed. Today’s competition of technology giants is not over optical fiber cables; The development roadmap goes through satellite internet and Direct-to-Cell technology. Just now that Starlink has made its services free for Iran and its waves reach the ground regardless of geographical borders, the alarm of Iran’s sovereignty over the Internet has sounded. With direct satellite internet becoming ubiquitous in the very near future, neither registry plans will make sense, nor will tying the government’s hands benefit, nor will anything called Internet blocking governance be relevant.
In fact, the legislators are raising a wall that technology has rendered ineffective before it is finished. This issue has disturbed the radical movement and conservatives. Because they know that there is not much time left until the complete release of the flow of information. The haste, concealment and insistence on approving this plan in these inflammatory days show that they are exploiting the dusty atmosphere of war. In the twilight of regional crises, they want to impose their restrictive and anti-people structures as a law on the executive institutions before liberating technologies spread, so that maybe they can hold on to this decaying monopoly for a few more days.
But this calculation, like their previous economic and political calculations, is completely wrong. The people who have proven over the decades that they will not bow down to external pressures and the ominous shadow of war, will stand strong against the enemies of freedom, internal monopolists and filtering traders. The dynamic society of Iran, which has learned how to survive and breathe in the heart of crises, will never allow some people to take the most obvious rights of citizenship, freedom of expression and the arteries of its digital economy hostage under the guise of law and under the pretext of security. What monopolists should know is that the Internet cannot be rationed with a garrison view. A repeated experiment, the result of which is nothing but people running away from the government to the arms of kind American nannies. Do not repeat the mistake!
