Iran Cuts-Off Internet Sites Amidst Outbreak Of Coronavirus
IRAN CUTS-OFF INTERNET AMIDST CORONAVIRUS – Iran had continued to scramble to contain the outbreak of the new coronavirus.
Recently, an adviser to Supreme Leader Khamenei was infected with COVID-19 and died. Moments after the announcement, the government blocked access to informational sites such as the Persian version Wikipedia.
Access to the site was restored shortly, however, social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook remained banned. According to an article from Vice, the government wanted to control the spread of information regarding the country.
In addition, the article said they wanted to keep a grip on the narrative revolving the deadly disease.
Following this, Netblocks, a digital rights advocacy group that tracks internet disruptions around the world stated that there have been widespread disruptions at night.
Tactics such as this had been previously used as a popular method of restricting information to control the narrative.
Regimes such as in China had been conducting the same practices. Wikipedia had been permanently blocked in China and Turkey had blocked the site for three years.
Additionally, in November 2019, Tehran cut almost all global internet connections amidst a countrywide protest. This prevented the world to know exactly what was going on.
Iran had become the country with the highest number of deaths outside of China. There have now been 2,922 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 92 deaths.
Among the fatalities, at least 23 of them were lawmakers of Iran. This included the deputy health minister Iraj Harichi.
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