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Iran’s Internet Shutdown Hides a Deadly Crackdown
- tpmx 4y agoThe lack of detailed reporting from Iran the past week is disturbing, to say the least. Are there any (for the lack of a better word) "western" (I mean, I'd also trust, for example NHK, SBS, ABC Australia, etc) journalists from credible journalistic institutions on the ground in Iran? I admit I'm ignorant to the limits of independent reporting I'm certain the government of Iran mandates.
- MonkeyMalarky 4y agoI imagine that institutions are still wary of sending their journalists to Iran after what happened to Zahra Kazemi.
- dmix 4y agoIt’s very hard to get an Iranian visa as a journo
- pessimizer 4y agoWe do have a habit of sending spies as journalists. edit: we definitely do this. Also as grad students. Be upset about it, but not with me. The fact that we do this means that US journalists are limited in where they can go. Just like the fact that we're totally willing to send spies as NGO doctors administering vaccinations means that we can't do vaccination campaigns in countries that need help, or the fact that we send spies embedded with weapons/nuclear inspectors means that inspectors can't get access to things.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 4y agoDo you have a source for that claim?
- novaleaf 4y agoI don't, but you can always watch the movie "Argo" for a dramatization of actual CIA activity
- aiProgMach 4y ago
- csomar 4y agoIt's problematic because both sides have political backgrounds: The West would like to take advantage of the current chaos to perpetrate a possible revolution. The Iranian government is aware of that, and that regardless of the truth about the death of the girl it's going to be used against it. The public has reasons not to believe the government story. You have to understand that the "morality police" has nothing to do with morality and it's a result of the power structures making the current Iranian society. In a way, the "morality police" makes the Iranian government weaker and not stronger but it's a ruling tool. This day-to-day ruling tool and its resulting stability comes at the cost of the possible revolution when the general population have had enough. Will this time be the one? Who knows but at this time the sanctions can come in very handy. (if not for making this successful, they'd be used as leverage of the next negotiations round)
- tmnvix 4y agoDW are covering it in their regular online news bulletins. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE_SfNVNyqk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE_SfNVNyqk
- Siira 4y agoThe Iranian journalists who covered the death of Mahsa Amini are now imprisoned. The Internet has been mostly shut down. There are, obviously, no foreign journalists. The foreign media rebroadcasts coverage Iranians can somehow upload.
- JSfran 4y agoAs Iranian, I disagree! Those reporter of western mainstream media (last time I watched France24) which have a presence there needs to incorporate some propaganda and reports within the red lines at best. Otherwise, like many others they will be asked to leave the country or if they be Iranian correspondents they even can face serious charges (some form of treason)! As Iranian, I usually watch with good amounts of doubts such reports with their Iran correspondence. The last time, the anchor said: "It's very good that we have you over there, let me ask...". For me, it was Nope! It actually worse than we have you over there. It means you need to conform! It was even more surprising later for me that even in the western main stream media, the regime propaganda is the main voice that I hear, believe it or not you can research the NIAC network (Iran under-cover lobbyists) and see how often they're consulted as journalists/commentators on Iran issue in those medias. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Iranian_American_Council https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Iranian_American_Coun... I agree, there is a lack of resources here and Iranian journalists are responsible in part. But in defense there are not much hope/resources for independent journalism overall not only on this matter but almost any other. Simply money talks and sifting through that needs focus and great deal of time!
- hassanahmad 4y agoThere are some weird news coming from Iran in recent past.
- qwertox 4y agoWhat a valuable comment...
- bongoman37 4y agoSome girl was killed because she lacked enough haircover. Just reading this makes it seem so utterly insane. A living, breathing, person was killed for a piece of cloth. Shame on anyone who defends it in any way, and shame on a culture that thinks it is okay.
- davikr 4y ago@dang: is someone automatically flagging almost all of this user's posts? many past comments and threads seem innocuous at a glance but have been flagged dead.
- bongoman37 4y agoWow... how would you even know this? Whose wrath did I incur?
- zmgsabst 4y agoHN implements shadowbans that way: Your comments appear, but are automatically flagged dead.
- bongoman37 4y ago
- tux2bsd 4y ago> defends it in any way, and shame on a culture that thinks it is okay. It?
- amir734jj 4y agoIranian government has a history of bloody crackdown. Enough is enough. There has been no free and fair election in the past decades so this government doesn't represent the people. I am worried this tyrannical government succeeds in putting down this movement and then the western governments sign another nuclear treaty which means sanction relief and more money for the regime that doesn't represent the people. The west should recognize that this government is a dictatorship and is not afraid of using any means including live bullets to put down protests.
- lazide 4y agoOk, but what does that actually mean? The reality is, unless the Iranians themselves replace the Ayatollahs, it would require a foreign sponsored coup or outright invasion to meaningfully change the status quo there.
- amir734jj 4y agoIt means: 1) publicly condemn the government 2) recognize that this government doesn't represent the people of Iran 3) don't give money to this government.
- lazide 4y agoAnyone giving money to Iran already gets sanctioned by the US, no? And the gov’t is already pretty isolated, except for ‘persona non grata’ countries like North Korea or Russia anyway. And I doubt those folks are going to change their mind over what’s going on.
- MonkeyMalarky 4y agoI think point 3 is this, no? >I am worried this tyrannical government succeeds in putting down this movement and then the western governments sign another nuclear treaty which means sanction relief and more money for the regime
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
- hi_herbert 4y ago
- adventured 4y ago[flagged]
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y agoThere are biases depending on the 'side' of US political spectrum a given medium happens to be supporting. In this case, the best you can do is to account for inherent bias and ingest the information accordingly.
- baskethead 4y agoThis is patently false. Iran has been called part of the Axis of Evil since Reagan era. Iran has been reported on as evil for decades. This current set of protests have gotten a lot of media attention. The reason why Khashoggi gets so much attention is because reporters love nothing more than to report about themselves. There are plenty of other people who were killed by Saudi Arabia that got buried because the media doesn't care.
- miracle2k 4y agoHe was a journalist, but he was also working for the Washington Post in particular, and he was an US resident, and the details of this murder where particularly gruesome. No need for the jab about the media here.
- baskethead 4y agoThe jab about the media is absolutely warranted. How many women are found dismembered in the US almost every day? There was just a case last week in NYC. The media doesn't pick it up, but with Khashhoggi they did, because they care the most about journalists. I'm not saying that it wasn't horrific what happened to him, but the question was why was there so much focus on his case, and the reason is because the media loves to report on themselves over anything else.
- paulryanrogers 4y agoWhen a foreign government is suspected of dismembering a US resident it has more geo-political implications. Despite the fact that every grusome crime deserves equal treatment from the justice system.
- baskethead 4y agoI'm not a pro-NRA gun nut, and I hate to say it, but this shows you the dangers of when only the government has the guns. I'm pretty sure that if guns were available to regular people, there would have been a transition to a different government decades ago. The fact that this backwards, misogynistic government can remain in power for the better part of a century despite Iran being filled with highly educated people with a rich culture is a crime against humanity. And yes, I'm fully aware that this was caused by the US and the CIA, my point is that it should be taken down by its citizens but it has no power to do so.
- brutal_chaos_ 4y agoA woman in Iran would not be allowed to own a gun. Maybe men, if any people. We have cops cuffing you, throwing you in the back of their car, and leaving said car on train tracks to be hit by an on coming train (see Colorado police video gaining traction in the news). The cops (morality police) in Iran killed the poor woman for indecency. The cops in the US still act egregiously and we have guns. Guns will not help.
- baskethead 4y agoA woman in Iran would not be allowed to own a gun only because of the fascist regime in place today. Back pre-Ayatollah, Iran wasn't as misogynistic as it is today. It was one of the most forward Muslim nations in the world. I imagine that if Iran were liberated, they would be similar to Israel in the sense that men and women would all be mobilized into an army and trained such that something like the Ayatollah could never happen again.
- Alir3z4 4y agoThat would be civil war for sure. Syria/Libya/etc 2.0 There are enough separatist groups in Iran backed up by many foreign countries, already armed and they do their share of evil on civilians and law enforcement and military. Replacing any government by any means usually ends up with power vacuum, breeds terrorists and unleash demons from hell.
- 4y ago
- flyinglizard 4y agoIran is very good at oppressing and subduing its citizens. There won’t be any change without foreign military intervention, either outright or by arming minorities and the populace to wage an internal civil war. A USA which is preoccupied with Russia and China and still licking its wounds from Iraq and Afghanistan isn’t going to do any of those; they’d rather just pay up to keep Iran on the right side of the nuclear brink. I hope I’m wrong on all these counts, but so far the Mullahs have been going strong.
- Alir3z4 4y agoIran in particular is very good to keep those foreign military intervention checked on their place without even having any deterrent like Nuclear bomb capabilities.
- tester756 4y agoWhy? how?
- Alir3z4 4y agoAfter Iran-Iraq and being sanctioned to hell while even being invaded, Iran went into the process of independent military complex and so far has mastered to become almost fully self-sustaining (except military fighter jets, which they're trying to replace with Drones) The geography of Iran is Afghanistan 100x when it comes to moving military equipments as well due to mountains and deserts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Eagle_Claw https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Eagle_Claw just one of them) Guerrilla and asymmetrical warfare is up to many levels Among other is the missile capabilities which changes the game dramatically as well. Another factor, is the mix of regular Army and IRGC which is a full topic how they differ and operate. _above just top of my head and very brief, there so many other factors that with good research can be found_ Ofc, not saying Iran is DA GREATEST and MOST POWERFUL, but for sure is able to keep up a bloody fight that causes damage to the enemy so high that no country after Iraq has dared to start one. Regardless, let's hope no country decides to attack another country, there's enough bloodshed
- 4y ago
- bink 4y agoIANAL, but how are Instagram and WhatsApp allowed to operate in Iran? Do embargoes not apply to online services? I'd love to see companies such as Google and Apple implement optional mesh networking as an over-the-air update to their phones in order to help people communicate during times like this.
- tpmx 4y ago> IANAL, but how are Instagram and WhatsApp allowed to operate in Iran? Do embargoes not apply to online services? That's a pretty good point, actually. > I'd love to see companies such as Google and Apple implement optional mesh networking as an over-the-air update to their phones in order to help people communicate during times like this. The tech isn't really there yet. It's both a hardware (BT doesn't reach far enough) and a software problem. You don't just "casually" implement a global mesh-based network without a careful and quite explicit system design involving HW and SW in tandem. Nevermind the largest problem: How do you prioritize traffic in a distributed, fair and and scalable way, on nodes that you can't trust, once the mesh network gets really popular?
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y agoIn general, sanctions are notoriously complicated ( sometimes with seemingly -- or actually -- contradictory notes ). And just to complicate it even further, it uses a system of waivers ( licenses ), which allow you to ask OFAC to engage in some ( usually explicitly listed ) of the otherwise prohibited activity. Due to their size and reach, it is not unlikely that both entities secured such a license. Naturally, there is a compliance cost that they incur as a result, but I am sure there is an interest in US government to keep those lines of communications open for one reason or another.
- BrainVirus 4y agoWe need better news outlets than Wired to cover stuff like this. Frankly, after the last few years I don't trust a word they say about freedom of speech on the Internet. I don't have any reliable knowledge about Iran, so there is no easy way for me to double-check anything without spending hundreds of hours on research, and even then the results will be uncertain. We live in a kind of dark age of news media, while simultaneously suffering from information overflow.
- timcavel 4y ago
- klabb3 4y ago> The blocks against WhatsApp also appear to have impacted people outside of Iran. People using Iranian +98 telephone numbers have complained that WhatsApp has been slow to work or not functioning at all. WhatsApp has denied it is doing anything to block Iranian phone numbers. I doubt that Zuck would help the Iranian govt, which would suggest technical reason or an attack, which makes me curious. It's likely that +98 numbers outside Iran are connected to those inside that are blocked, but could that cause some bottleneck in whatsapp infra? Or could the Iranian govt be running some ddos style attack on certain phone numbers over whatsapp?
- sangnoir 4y agoPerhaps they are data roaming? That's the most reasonable explanation I can think of.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- hsuduebc2 4y agoHow it is possible to not let send messages containing name of a first victim when WhatsApp should have end to end encryption? Kinda weird
- changoplatanero 4y agomy guess is that that part of the article is not referencing whatsapp. they are talking about ordinary unencrypted texts there
- mylons 4y agoit’s almost like facebook has no incentive to provide a quality service that lives up to it’s promises given it’s monopolistic presence/practices.
- icare_1er 4y agoCreating a Signal Proxy To Bypass Iranian Censorship https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf-mtjEF4t0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf-mtjEF4t0 Iran is only topped by North Korea in its backwards oppression of Iranians (at least those would did not manage to flee and join the huge world-wide diaspora).
- gumby 4y agoI saw a series of photos with descriptions published by the AP. Each photo was labeled "sourced from a person with no affiliation with the AP" before its caption. They are trying hard not to make their reporters targets. Having read this I now presume they were sourced from 1500tasvir.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- eternalban 4y agoThey apparently executed a 21 year old woman. Six bullets to the face, chest and neck. Her name is Hadis Najafi. Family was apparently pressured by IRI security services to accept "heart attack" as cause of death. They refused. What an amazing family! [One picture is post-execution - forewarned] https://nitter.net/pic/orig/media%2FFdgROQUX0AAHqrn.jpg https://nitter.net/pic/orig/media%2FFdgROQUX0AAHqrn.jpg #hadis_najafi #حدیث_نجفی Hussein Ronaghi (who must be some sort of superhero in unassuming human attire) left a video testament before presenting himself at the judiciary. Where he was promptly set upon by government agents to administer initial justice right in front the building. Last heard from, according to his mother, he is in hospital with a broken legs. Beaten after his arrest. His lawyers are apparently also under arrest for good measure. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hossein_Ronaghi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hossein_Ronaghi If you are an Iranian, you must listen to what this exceptional man has to say: https://nitter.net/masoudkazemi81/status/1573719903835668482#m https://nitter.net/masoudkazemi81/status/1573719903835668482... #حسین_رونقی #hussein_ronaghi Btw, NYTimes neglected to devote a single sentence to the fact that the reporter (female) and photojournalist (male) team that reported the murder of 22 year old Mahsa Amini. US and EU are negotiating with the Islamic Republic and actually covering this may be bad for business, right NYTimes? #مهسا_امینی #mahsa_amini Also, AnonymousOpIran has been 'busy' and have lots of hacking stories to share: https://nitter.net/anonymousopiran https://nitter.net/anonymousopiran #opIran
- amir734jj 4y agoI am an Iranian and I am with you. I have seen what this tyrannical government is capable of. We as Iranian living abroad 1) can sent letter to our representative to make sure we cut the funding to this government 2) keep protesting and keep the momentum going. They can't win.
- eternalban 4y agoMore. There are a lot of these radical ideologue supporters of IR working in USA. They need to go back to Karbala. Let's give them a push. Let's give these hard working IR agent a bright shining spotlight of 'publicity'.
- bambooza 4y ago