Continued Crackdown on Social Media Activists, an Instagram Blogger Arrested in Semnan

News sources reported the arrest of an Instagram blogger in Semnan by security forces due to what was termed 'the dissemination of norm-breaking challenges.' The Tasnim news agency, affiliated with security institutions, announced in a report that 'agents of the Semnan Intelligence Police identified and arrested an individual who was publishing norm-breaking challenges on Instagram.' According to images published from this social media activist's account, after the arrest, a story of 'apology' along with a 'commitment to operate within the framework of the laws of the Islamic Republic' was posted. Just yesterday, on Saturday, March 10, the Intelligence Organization of the Isfahan Police Command announced that a female blogger active on Instagram had been arrested and handed over to the relevant authorities. In the published statement, the arrest of this woman was described as part of the 'crackdown on norm-breakers active in cyberspace' and accused of 'publishing vulgar and obscene content.' Officials of the Islamic Republic of Iran have introduced mandatory hijab and restrictions on social freedoms as 'norms' and punish any resistance in these areas under the pretext of 'norm-breaking.' So far, hundreds of cyber activists and dozens of Instagram pages belonging to small businesses, including hairdressing, have faced judicial actions with similar accusations, and in some cases, these pages have been blocked. Recently, AFP reported the closure of some Instagram business accounts in Iran due to 'non-compliance with hijab and Islamic decorum' or 'publishing content contrary to public morality and decency.' In January of this year, the police chief of Bushehr province, Haidar Sossani, reported actions against 27 Instagram pages related to hairdressing and 27 'norm-breaking' hairdressers in Bushehr. The police chief of Mazandaran, Hassan Mofakhami Shahrak, also reported in November the identification and crackdown on 302 social media users, claiming that these individuals were promoting and disseminating immorality, such as non-hijab, indecency, vulgar modeling, and immoral live broadcasts in cyberspace. In the latest report from 'Freedom House,' the Iranian government was identified as one of the violators of freedom last year, and Iran is still recognized as a 'non-free' country in terms of freedom indicators. While the Iranian government has banned public access to Facebook and Instagram in the country, the recent blocking of accounts belonging to Ali Khamenei on these two social networks by Meta has been criticized by the Iranian Foreign Minister. Hossein Amir-Abdollahian described Meta's decision as 'a violation of freedom of expression, insulting, unethical, and illegal,' and called it 'a sign of the collapse of morality and the decline of the moral system in the world.'