Iran Extends Social Media Crackdown With Move To Bar Instagram (bloomberg.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Authorities in Iran are preparing to block access to Instagram, extending their crackdown on social media to the only major platform still freely available. The National Cyberspace Council approved steps toward blocking the service, Javad Javidnia, deputy for cyberspace affairs at the public prosecutor's office, was cited as saying by the semi-official Donya-e Eqtesad newspaper. Instagram would join Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Telegram in being banned in the Islamic Republic, ostensibly for reasons of national security.

Despite the restrictions, Iranians including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif continue to use the services, which are widely accessible via proxy servers. Rouhani's verified Twitter account has over 800,000 followers. Javidnia said efforts to filter Instagram hadn't worked. While judicial and political officials involved were yet to reach a consensus on barring the site, the prosecutor can take a unilateral decision to do so, he said.

Comments

America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

Puritanical conservative laws like SESTA and FOSTA (among others) will push content hosts into the dark ages.

And if you dare censor their violent rightwing "a lot of good people" hate speech, their fee fees get hurt and they will seek to shut you down.

Re:America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

Puritanical conservative laws like SESTA and FOSTA (among others) will push content hosts into the dark ages.

And if you dare censor their violent rightwing "a lot of good people" hate speech, their fee fees get hurt and they will seek to shut you down.

Yeah but these are stupid dune coons and sand níggers stuck in the dark ages because of Islam. So they will shut themselves down long before we do!

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly, but how can we stop Hillary?

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

But...Hillary. Oh my, another lame-brain Trumpanzee.

Re:America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

So, child porn is ok and anything that makes pink hair snowflakes uncomfortable is not.

Got it.

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate both, is hating both ok?

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

But...Hillary. Oh my, another lame-brain Trumpanzee.

Insulting people you don't know is a solid indication you are not very smart, or very mature.

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Locke2005]

"Buttery males!"

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Locke2005]

Hating both is both okay and perfectly natural! Hillary Clinton, the first 100% charisma free candidate, and Donald Trump, the first candidate absolute unencumbered by any sense of ethics whatsoever! What's not to hate?

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Locke2005]

So, insulting people you don't know makes you exactly like Donald Trump? Yep, sounds right to me!

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you don't want censorship of things you agree with, but you're OK with censorship of things you disagree with?

Re: America is heading down the same road

[Anonymous Coward]

"Puritanical conservative laws like SESTA and FOSTA"

Those are puritanical feminazi laws. I understand it's hard to tell them apart, but do try to keep up with the times.

Move To Bar Instagram

[Anonymous Coward]

Move To Bar Instagram

Then, I assume they barred the San Jose IT clerk videos a long time ago.

Can the United States follow suit?

[Anonymous Coward]

The country (and the world) would be a better place without it.

Release the Jew Upon The Persian

[Anonymous Coward]

And grab the popcorn. F16s bombing a fledgling nuke site was only the beginning of this movie. The middle has been dull. The ending. The ending is when the popcorn comes out.

Re:Release the Jew Upon The Persian

[Anonymous Coward]

And grab the popcorn. F16s bombing a fledgling nuke site was only the beginning of this movie. The middle has been dull. The ending. The ending is when the popcorn comes out.

Do you really believe the Arab countries are going to just sit on their hands and allow Israel to destroy them ?

Fuck Israel anyway. When the Israelis MURDERED Rachel Corrie, they were added to the list of history's evil empires. Israel is now no better than the Nazis they claim to despise.

Re:Release the Jew Upon The Persian

[Anonymous Coward]

Persians are not arabs. Persians are asians like the Japanese and Chinese are asians.

Youtube shadow bans comments : what's the differen

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally I don't know what's worse : declared censorship or covert one. Maybe the latter.
What strikes me most is that you can find plenty of uncensored crazy comments about Jews etc. but the shadow banned ones are actually the polite, thoughtful and backed by links

Can we change the subject to America, please?

[DNS-and-BIND]

I know this is about Iran, but I'd like to change the subject to how awful AmeriKKKa is and how much censoring we do. Deal? Nobody talk about Iran.

solutions

[Anonymous Coward]

If the only tool you have is a socket, all your problems look like connections.

Better be careful

[bobstreo]

If you block access to Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Telegram, the people of your country may come out of their Internet induced comas, and have the time and energy to realize they should create a better country.

Thank goodness that would never happen in the U.S. /s

Re:Better be careful

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be a nice outcome, but it's not what will happen.

A lot of things are already forbidden in the country and yet people use them all the time. I spent quite a bit of time there and most people I met someone actively used Facebook, despite the official ban. Many places have alcohol easily available, even during ramadan. In cities you can go to a party every night. In fact I quite frequently heard the phrase "every rule is there to be bent or broken".
Every Iranian appears to have a VPN or TOR connection of some sort. Many westerners could take an example from them. They will just move their Telegram use to their VPN.

Finally

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone had the guts to PATROL thos' fuckin' instagram THOTS!

That's nothing

[Locke2005]

They've also banned having sex standing up, because they are afraid it will lead to dancing!

Sure

[rsilvergun]

Iran was well on it's way to secularizing before we put a fanatical right wing whack job in power because we didn't want them keeping their oil (which rightfully belonged to American corporations and the American ruling class). Then when it came time to throw those bums out the only place to foment a revolution was in mosques so we wound up with more right wing whack jobs with the added bonus of being completely batshit religiously insane. We did the same in South America (the guy who started MS-13 did so in America with training from our CIA) and Afghanistan (we created the Taliban).

Go Team America!

Re:Sure

[DNS-and-BIND]

"We" didn't do that, it was the CIA. It didn't ask the elected government for permission, it just did it. Much like it, still today, doesn't bother to ask the elected government or God forbid the people.

But thanks for heeding my request and changing the topic away from Iran's censorship into the same boilerplate hate for America. That means a lot.

Re:Sure

[Anonymous Coward]

The CIA has a mandate, GOP Congress has had control of it for decades and did nothing but cover for it. Stop apologizing faggot.

Re:Sure

[Anonymous Coward]

The shah was a brutal dictator, but not a "right wing whack job". If anything, he tried to secularize the country by force.

He was not put there by the US. What actually happened was entirely different ftom the accepted version: the coup was actually done by the "socialist" PM which ditched the shah (it was a constitutional monarchy) and basically set himself up as dictator. The CIA (which did plan a coup of its own but was preempted) tried to start a counter revolution with its assets but failed miserably. The PM almost won but yhen made a fatal error: announcing publicily which officials he was going to purge before even arresting the would be victims! Bad idea, since all of the officials and their supporters switched allegiance at once. Oops. Later on it was very comfortable for everyone to adopt a false version: the CIA hid its failures, commies got to blame the US, and Americans like to believe the world revolve around them.

P.S. The taliban was set up by Pakistan alone, and MS-13 has very different origins.

Re:Sure

[Anonymous Coward]

Why so angry? I'm sorry she doesn't want you anymore.

Re:Sure

[Anonymous Coward]

But, but, but, the CIA is good now! Has been since January 20,2017.

Who cares?

[wyattstorch516]

There is no way to blame this on Donald Trump so I doubt you will see many comments on this board.

Maybe a few people will come along with "What about Saudi Arabia?" arguments.

Re:Who cares?

[AHuxley]

The more the gov bans the internet, the more people will want the freedoms of a CIA backed internet.
Bans just make what is banned more interesting.
People at home, distracted by the free internet is better than people at home with free hours working on how to protest.
Embrace the calming and distracting aspect of the internet.
Give academic work filling the internet with Persian culture.
Let the internet stay open and track all its users.
Average people will spend hours watching video clips.
The politically minded will use the internet to try and communicate.
Watch as the CIA attempt another color revolution. Watch as the CIA funds the spreading of socialist ideology.
Some parallel construction and people would still "trust" the internet. Its always an informant, not the failed crypto :)
Now people know the gov is tracking the net. The most easy way to track all emerging dissidents is lost to the gov.

rsilvergun is still dumb

[Anonymous Coward]

And you liberals are losing your shit because Trump is getting out of the war in Syria that Obama started.

Sounds like it is the progressives that are getting involved in everyone's shit and getting upset when the only adult in DC, Trump, is not playing along.
Don't worry, you have established yourself so moronically dumb you will support and vote for the first person running for president in 2020 that will go back to doing this kind of thing, like Hillary Clinton promised to (along with her promise to start a shooting war with the USSR).

Re:rsilvergun is still dumb

[Anonymous Coward]

War used to be bad. But now war is good. Has been for 10 years now.

Actually part of me is sad that Hitlerly lost. Most of the slashbots here would have frozen to death in Stalingrad by now.

so just to be clear

[cascadingstylesheet]

So just to be clear ... Iran is an actual theocracy.

Not just a "theocracy" like as a slam against your political opponents, not an imaginary theocracy like your Handmaid Tale crap, Iran is an actual theocracy.

There is nothing surprising about this at all.