Analysts say | The U.S. news of Internet-related hijacking of websites is “brief”

Tehran, Iran – As in 2015 when Iran canceled its 2015 nuclear deal, the United States promises that another unilateral movement will once again make Iran’s life worse, this time in terms of Internet freedom, analysts say.

In a surprise move on Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Justice 36 websites hijacked For conducting “disinformation campaigns and ill-influence operations” on ties with the Iranian state.

The move sparked suspicions of a hack, a warning that “this website has been intercepted,” along with an Arabic text, instead of a farce, and Ned Price, a spokesman for the State Department, wanted to deny it to U.S. officials working in Iran.

The kidnappings Iran and world powers – including the US – will soon begin their seventh and perhaps final round of negotiations in Vienna. restore the 2015 nuclear deal What the US abandoned in 2018.

The sanctions imposed by the U.S. since then have been the harshest Iran has ever seen, leading to violent inflation and unemployment in the deadliest COVID-19 pandemic in the Middle East.

The Justice Department eventually said three of the hijacked domains belonged to the Iraqi Kataeb Hezbollah group, and the rest, including Yemen, Palestinian and Bahraini outlets in English and Arabic, belonged to the Islamic Radio and Television Union of Iran, allegedly a foreign-looking Quds of the Revolutionary Guard Corps. Force.

The seized websites were among the so-called “resistance axes” that Iran supports throughout the region, influencing rivals in regions such as the US and Israel and Saudi Arabia.

The U.S. listed it with “terrorism-related” designations and said U.S. companies do not have permission to supply .com and .net domains without special permission from the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).

The move drew quick criticism from Iranian officials and limited outlets, including the main Press TV, Iran’s main English-language television channel.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry cited the kidnapping as an example of a “systematic effort to distort freedom of expression worldwide and to silence independent voices in the media,” adding that Iran will continue on legal avenues.

‘National Information Network’

While the U.S. may have the ability to influence broad sections of the Internet, its actions may have large branches beyond its control.

Observers fear that the kidnappings will only reinforce arguments in favor of the so-called National Information Network (NIN), which is a massive nationalization initiative on Iran’s Internet.

In the end there is a precedent.

Foreign governments have no right to spread misinformation in the United States, of course. U.S. citizens and residents have a constitutionally protected right to receive information from abroad. It is not clear that this right has been given due weight here. https://t.co/GbAK5PxBdG

– Jameel Jaffer (@JameelJaffer) June 22, 2021

In January 2020, the news was still dominated by consequences US drone killing General Qassem Soleimani and IRGC missile fire on U.S. bases and the demolition of a passenger plane, the .com domain of the Fars News Agency agency was blocked.

Shortly afterwards, the Donald Trump administration also took over the IRAN newspaper’s website and several other affiliated outlets.

A month later, Kataeb used two websites used by Hezbollah and 92 domain names that were “descendants of Iran’s IRGC to conduct a global illegal disinformation campaign.”

These facts gave credibility to the arguments of intervention and censorship used by the Iranian officials to persuade citizens and continue working with the NIN for more than 10 years.

Sadjad Bonabi, an infrastructure development official at the Ministry of Information and Communication Technologies, said in January 2020 that the infrastructure provided by the NIN had “alleviated many concerns about cruel sanctions”.

“The Iranian authorities are using excuses – whether from strong factions or members of President Hassan Rouhani’s moderate government – to use the NIN project to justify the need to strengthen Iran’s nationalization on the Internet,” Mahsa Alimardani, a British human rights activist, told Al Jazeera.

But the NIN could have positive effects, such as easing access to online services, reducing costs and increasing efficiency, while some Iranians are concerned about the potential use of restricting Internet access.

These concerns proved true in November 2019, amid nationwide protests over tripling fuel costs, the state almost completely shutting down internet access around the world for a week – already in several cities – and began cracking down on rights groups. he killed hundreds of people. At that time only a few local Internet services were available through the NIN.

In addition, officials elected by President Ebrahim Raisi spoke about, among other things, the layered internet access model that will provide internet-based people with a level of internet access and “legal VPN” (virtual private networks).

Long-term effects

In the meantime, the U.S. will not make much profit in the long run from listing domains associated with Iran, mainly because they will not be offline.

PressTV, for example, switched to the .ir domain immediately after its .com address was hijacked. The same thing happened with Fars when his website was hijacked last year.

Following Wednesday’s kidnappings, Iranian ICT Minister Mohammad Javad Azari-Jahromi promised that his ministry would provide “necessary infrastructure” for the seized outlets.

According to the language used by the US authorities in the announcement of the kidnappings, the Iranian outlets also aimed to try to influence the 2020 presidential election, as Alimardani of ARTICLE19 finds something strange.

“This in itself is a strange excuse to punish these entities, as these outlets are considered‘ white propaganda ’outlets and not‘ agents ’of‘ operating ’operations,” he said.

He said that while the U.S. could cause some inconvenience in outlets, including hurting their branding efforts and Google search results, the “limit” was short, as it helped the U.S. argue that it is imperial power and persecution.

“America” reduces its position and effort as a “promoter of internet freedom” with these efforts, ”he said.

“While this case does not directly address innocent civilian users in Iran, the movement is indirectly pushing for Iranian politics .ir domains for further nationalization and promotion for websites hosted by ordinary Iranians.”

Criminal expert Brian O’Toole has told Al Jazeera that the designation “terrorism” gives the U.S. Department of Justice legal reasons to take such actions.

“However, even if the DOJ had legal reasons to seize these Iranian websites, it is difficult to understand how they would be prevented in the future or have a material impact on such news,” the former OFAC adviser said today. Atlantic Council.

“Instead, I am concerned that the action is very heavy and will provoke criticism of the United States for reproducing‘ speech ’, even though all this has no effect on frustrating terrorism. [or electoral interference]”.