NCRI – The Iranian regime’s Intelligence Minister ‘Mahmoud Alavi’ said on Sunday March 12 that “an elections headquarter has been formed in the Ministry of Intelligence from long to ensure timely and preemptive measures will be taken against destructive and negative efforts during the election campaigns.”
According to state-run ISNA news agency, he warned that “those who are seeking to disturb the cyberspace with their destructive measures, will be dealt with.”
“These destructive measures might take place in papers, websites, and social networks such as Twitter or Instagram, over all of which the Ministry of Intelligence has total control”, said the Intelligence Minister.
Being aware of the role of social networks and their influence on the protests following 2009 presidential election, Iranian regime’s officials are attempting to monitor the cyberspace.
During regime’s tenth parliamentary election last year, an ‘election security headquarters’ was formed by the Ministry of Intelligence, Revolutionary Guards, and the law enforcement forces, aimed at monitoring the internet to ensure election security by countering what they called enemies’ destructive measures.
Prior to 2013 presidential election, Police Spokesman Saeed Montazer al-Mahdi had announced that “police is trying to hold a totally secure election with complete informational readiness, while monitoring the cyberspace, dissident satellite networks, etc.”
The Iranian regime’s repressive measures regarding the use of social networks are taken at a time when many of these networks are blocked and using them is illegal.
Despite the ban, however, many of regime’s officials including Khamenei and Rouhani are active members of social media and messaging networks.
The Iranian regime has a long history of blocking websites and arresting internet users, with its peak being following 2009 presidential election, during which many of the websites and social networks like Facebook and Twitter were out of reach, and mobile phone messaging service stopped working as well.
