NCRI – Iran under the mullahs is one of the world’s five ‘state enemies of the Internet’ for conducting online surveillance that results in arrests and human rights violations, a new report has revealed.
The mullahs’ paranoid regime was named alongside countries like Syria and China as a nation that monitors the Internet to target dissidents and critics, the scathing study by Reporters Without Borders said.
In the case of Iran, the dictatorship had taken surveillance ‘to a whole new level’ by developing its own internal national Internet, according to the report published to mark World Day Against Cyber-Censorship on March 12.
Around 180 ‘netizens’ were currently in prison around the world solely for providing news and information online, it said.
In Syria, Reporters Without Borders has said it had seen an unpublished 1999 document by the Syrian Telecommunications Establishment which shows that its Internet was designed from the outset to include extensive filtering and surveillance.
Reporters Without Borders has also for the first time compiled a list of five ‘Corporate Enemies of the Internet’ – private sector companies that it branded ‘digital era mercenaries’ because they sell products that enable authoritarian governments to commit human rights violations and restrict information. They were named as Gamma, Trovicor, Hacking Team, Amesys and Blue Coat.
