Iran’s government said Sunday that it would restore wider internet access for the country’s university professors, Iranian state media reported, even as the rest of the population heads into its 51st day of a near-total internet blackout.
The shutdown, which Iran said it imposed because of national security concerns during the war with the United States and Israel, has cut access to the internet for most of the country’s population of over 90 million.
For seven weeks, according to a tally by the internet monitoring group NetBlocks, Iran’s blackout has left most Iranians struggling to connect with loved ones abroad, cut off from most information beyond state media reports, and largely unable to run businesses dependent on internet access. Many Iranian business leaders and internet freedom activists have decried the blackout as a human rights violation and a serious threat to an economy that was already in deep in crisis.
Iranians can connect to a parallel domestic internet — walled off from international websites, and heavily surveilled by authorities. Only some Iranian officials and a limited cadre of elites have been granted an open connection.
Iranian authorities appear to have begun easing up some internet access in recent days. According to reports on semiofficial news outlets, access to Google searches and Google Maps has been restored. But internet experts note users still cannot actually open the sites that, for example, a Google search pulls up, and almost all other internet access remains blocked.
On Sunday, Seyed Mehdi Abtahi, Iran’s deputy science minister, told local Iranian news outlets that professors and researchers would soon be granted access to most online sites apart from those subject to censorship.
“Based on a list we had, steps have been taken to provide professors with access to the international internet, and gradually this will be extended to all professors,” Mr. Abtahi was quoted as saying by the semiofficial news agency, ISNA.
Some Iranians who have managed to access the internet using expensive and shoddy black market configurations have criticized public excitement over the announcement, saying it was a sign of just how dire the situation has become.
“How did things get to the point where people have to get excited over a partial connection to Google? For opening a few simple links — for the most basic right of access?” the prominent journalist, Elaheh Mohammadi, wrote on social media. “They want to lower people’s expectations so much that even the smallest things start to feel like a favor. That is the ultimate disregard for people’s dignity.”
In the past week, some internet providers have also begun to offer international internet service, “Internet Pro,” for those granted state approval.
Internet freedom activists, academics, and business figures have decried the easing of some restrictions as possible steps toward what Iranians call “tiered internet” — a system in which only the politically or economically privileged have significant access to the worldwide web.
“In Iran, the internet is no longer being treated as a public right. It is being reframed as a ‘strategic infrastructure’ whose level of access can be adjusted based on security concerns and high-level state priorities,” said Amir Rashidi, a cybersecurity expert at Miaan, a digital rights group focused on Iran.
“Once internet access is moved from a rights-based framework into a security-governance framework, it no longer belongs equally to everyone,” he said.
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