Here’s a novel approach to the internet, rather than attempting to block every Western site and their ideals towards freedom the Iranian government announced on Monday that it will create a “clean internet” by establish a country wide “intranet” program.
The new program will replace many American services such as Gmail and Google Plus with state-sponsored sites such as Iran Mail and Iran Search Engine, both which allow the government to more easily spy on users while censoring what content they are able to access.
Iran started moving towards a closed network after Twitters “Day Of Rage” protests targeted the countries government and led to massive protests and headaches for the countries central figures. In one case a man who was jailed was able to send a message via YouTube.
Iran has attempted to get Google, Twitter and other company’s to censor content however they have all refused to work with the countries suppressive regime citing freedom of speech as their main detractor.
In defending its position Mehdi Jafari, the head of technology and intelligence of the Iranian militia told ibtimes that Twitter, Facebook and other easy to access social networks have become the most “effective elements of soft war” as other countries allegedly push their own values and ideas onto Iran’s citizens through the use of those networks.
Iran isn’t the first country to severely limit communications among its people, citizens in North Korea are met with the same type of regulatory problems and most people in the country have never used a computer.
