Minister of Communications: Reports on Details of Asymmetrical Filtering are Completely False

The Minister of Communications and Information Technology of Iran called reports regarding the details of "asymmetrical filtering" "completely false" and announced that "no such plan has been proposed in the Ministry of Communications so far." Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi wrote on his Twitter on Saturday, December 9: "The issue recently published under the title of the asymmetrical filtering plan along with details is fundamentally false. No such plan has been proposed in the Ministry of Communications so far." On Tuesday, December 4, he had announced the initial approval of the Attorney General's Office for "asymmetrical filtering" of the internet, which, if implemented, would vary filtering based on factors such as occupation, age, and other user characteristics. Following these remarks, the Human Rights Campaign in Iran announced that if the "asymmetrical filtering system" plan is implemented, each individual would have to "disclose their identity to internet service providers" to access the internet. According to the Human Rights Campaign in Iran, "Thus, the private and personal information of internet users, including full name, national ID, occupation, gender, workplace and home address, will be made available to authorities and internet service providers, so that filtering can be applied based on what they determine as the level of access to internet content for individuals." However, Mr. Azari Jahromi, while denying this report, did not clarify his previous statements, and it remains unclear what the details of the "asymmetrical filtering" plan are. He had announced last Tuesday that the Attorney General's Office had set conditions for "asymmetrical filtering." According to Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology has also reviewed the Attorney General's proposals and prepared the "necessary technical response" for the implementation of this project. He expressed hope that the Attorney General's Office would ultimately agree with the proposals of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology so that filtering could be applied "based on the location, age, and other conditions of users." Officials from the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology had previously implemented the "smart filtering" plan for Instagram in the winter of 2014. Mahmoud Vaezi, the former Minister of Communications and Technology, had previously stated that the filtering of Instagram was 83% successful and that the ministry intends to extend the software used for filtering this network to other social networks. In smart filtering, access to websites is not completely restricted; rather, part of the content of the site identified by this software will be inaccessible to Iranian users. Internet filtering is the responsibility of the "Working Group for Determining the Instances of Criminal Content on the Internet," which is chaired by the Attorney General and includes senior political, security, and judicial officials.