Internet Outage Forces Iranians to Resort to Old Ways

Iranians struggled to adjust to life offline for almost a week and were forced to resort to old ways due to a near-total internet blackout imposed amid violent protests.

The demonstrations flared on November 15, hours after a shock decision announced at midnight to raise the price of petrol by up to 200 percent in the sanctions-hit country.

The timing of the announcement was seen as a bid to forestall chaos, such as caused by motorists stocking up on fuel before the hike took effect.

The internet restrictions, for their part, apparently aimed to temper shows of dissent and anger over the move and stop footage of the unrest from being shared.

Brigadier General Salar Abnoosh, a deputy head of the Basij volunteer militia, said Friday that the internet outage had helped to "disrupt the complicated" plans by Iran's enemies.

On Saturday—day seven of the internet restrictions and the start of the working week in Iran -- people in Tehran were trying to overcome problems brought on by the outage.

Some said they had been forced to make long journeys to carry out simple transactions that they used to be able to do in a couple of clicks online.

"We have no other choice," said a woman in her 30s who only gave her name as Asgari.

"What I could have done by using internet now I have to do by telephone or some other means," she told AFP.

"I've taken today off from work to come into town to do something which I could've done by using the internet."

Others said they were having difficulty reaching loved ones overseas.

"I wanted to call my children but I couldn't," said Taheri, a man in his 70s. "They were worried and had to go and get a card to call us. This is not right."

Economic Impact

For many in Iran, the lack of internet access was more than just a hindrance to social activity.

The country has a thriving online economy, with its own equivalents for apps like Airbnb, Amazon and Uber.

They have come through the outage largely unscathed as people can still access domestic applications on their phones.

However, smaller businesses that rely heavily on social media to stay in touch with their clients suffered during the outage.

Among them were travel agencies whose services were badly disrupted.

"An acute problem has been created for all travel agencies," said Hormatollah Rafiei, head of the Travel Agents Guild Association.

"The sale of foreign tickets and reservations for foreign hotels reached zero and some travel agencies closed due to financial losses," he said, quoted by ILNA news agency.

Connectivity in Iran "began to fluctuate on Friday evening (November 15) before a sequence of cuts that saw levels fall to a nadir of four percent" compared with normal levels, said Netblocks, a site that monitors global internet disruptions.

“Apart from fluctuations on Sunday, access to the outside world flatlined consistently until Thursday when limited connectivity appeared across most regions," it said

On Saturday, connectivity was back up, the monitor added.

'What Can We Do?'

Iran's arch-enemy the United States slapped sanctions on its telecommunications minister overnight "for restricting internet access".

The minister, Mohammad-Javad Azari Jahromi, said he was just another Iranian made to suffer the consequences of sanctions that the US reimposed after withdrawing from a 2015 nuclear deal.

"I'm not the only member of club of sanctioned persons," he tweeted.

"Before me, Iran ICT startups, Developers, Cancer patients and EB children were there," he said, referring to epidermolysis bullosa (EB).

Iran says the US sanctions have hindered its access to drugs for EB, a skin condition that afflicts children, causing several deaths.

The government said it would unblock the internet only when it was sure it would not be abused.

Mina, a woman in her 50s, said she had little choice but to sit tight

"My family lives abroad and I was always in touch with them but now I have no contact with them," she told AFP.

"I need to get a phone card because it's too expensive to call abroad (from a fixed line phone)," she added.

"What can we do? We are trying to stay patient."

Photo: IRNA

US Sanctions Iran Minister Over Internet Censorship

The US Treasury slapped punitive sanctions on Iran's communications minister, Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi, Friday after Tehran blocked internet communications amid violent protests triggered by a petrol price hike.

"We are sanctioning Iran's Minister of Information and Communications Technology for restricting internet access, including to popular messaging applications that help tens of millions of Iranians stay connected to each other and the outside world," said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin in a statement.

"Iran's leaders know that a free and open internet exposes their illegitimacy, so they seek to censor internet access to quell anti-regime protests," Mnuchin said.

The protests erupted across the country on November 15, after the price of petrol was raised by as much as 200 percent.

Officials have confirmed five deaths, while Amnesty International said that more than 100 demonstrators were believed to have been killed after authorities reportedly used live ammunition to quell the protests, which brought attacks on police stations and petrol stations and some looting of shops.

The Treasury said Azari Jahomi is a former official of the Ministry of Intelligence who has “been involved in surveillance against opposition activists," the Treasury said.

Internet service remained mostly blocked on Friday for a sixth day, with officials and news agencies saying the blackout was gradually being rolled back.

The sanctions would freeze financial assets and property Azari Jahomi has in US jurisdictions and forbid Americans or US businesses, especially banks, from dealing with him.

On Thursday, President Donald Trump accused Iran of blocking the internet to cover up "death and tragedy" resulting from the protests.

"Iran has become so unstable that the regime has shut down their entire Internet System so that the Great Iranian people cannot talk about the tremendous violence taking place within the country," Trump tweeted.

"They want ZERO transparency, thinking the world will not find out the death and tragedy that the Iranian Regime is causing!" he wrote.

Photo: IRNA