The Tehran E-Commerce Association, in an open letter to the new Minister of Communications and Information Technology, called for the fulfillment of the President’s promises and immediate actions to improve the quality of the Internet in Iran.
The text of the letter is as follows:
Dear Mr. Seyed Sattar Hashemi,
Honorable Minister of Communications and Information Technology,
As you are aware, the Tehran E-Commerce Association, representing a group of startups and major technology companies in the country, strives to contribute to the improvement of Internet quality in Iran, which is the backbone of the digital economy, through transparent reporting and active advocacy.
To this end, the Internet and Infrastructure Specialized Commission, under this association, was established with the mission of providing a clear picture of the quality of the Internet in Iran in three areas: disruption, restrictions, and speed. This commission, with an emphasis on transparency regarding the state of Internet quality and then advocating for the resolution of its dark spots, has so far published three reports on the state of Internet quality in Iran regularly and at six-month intervals. Additionally, after the publication of each report, efforts have been made to actively advocate both domestically (filtering, disruptions, infrastructure issues, etc.) and internationally (sanctions).
In line with this mission, the third report of this association is attached to this letter. Some of the key indicators of this report are as follows:
Iran ranks lowest in terms of free Internet access among the top 100 countries in the world (economically speaking).
In the indices related to disruptions and Internet speed, Iran ranks 90th out of 100 according to CRuX data and 97th out of 100 according to Cloudflare data.
Nearly 40% of users’ experiences with the top 5,000 most visited websites in the country involve complete disruption or slowness. Meanwhile, in the top 50 countries, this rate of disruption and slowness is less than 6%.
Technical representatives of operators believe that filtering equipment is the most effective factor in reducing the quality of the Internet in the country and the most serious obstacle to network development.
Government official reports on the Iran FTTX platform show that despite effective actions and significant growth, which has led to coverage for 7.5 million households, the number of fiber optic subscribers is still less than 550,000, and in major cities, including Tehran, the expansion of this technology faces serious obstacles.
Following the issues raised in the third Internet quality report, which coincided with the presidential elections, we made demands from the election candidates. Ms. Hamideh Zarabadi, spokesperson for Mr. Masoud Pezeshkian’s campaign, on the day of the third Internet quality report’s presentation, pledged that these demands would be pursued by the President and his administration. Our requests were categorized into three groups:
Active efforts to reform the filtering structure and reduce Internet restrictions.
Elimination of the monopoly of the Telecommunication Infrastructure Company and rapid development of the Internet.
Strengthening international diplomacy and efforts to lift international sanctions.
Some of these requests, including “immediate removal of disruptions caused by filtering systems under the supervision of private sector representatives,” “transparency in the votes of the six government representatives in the Committee for Determining Instances of Criminal Content,” and “transparent and real-time reporting of Internet indicators (reopening of deactivated platforms by the 13th government),” can be realized without any infrastructure, through bold and immediate decisions.
Furthermore, considering that the fourth Internet quality report will be published this fall, we request that the latest report of this association and its proposed solutions be presented to you in more detail, so that in the limited time remaining until the next report, the people of the country can witness the practical actions of the 14th government.
May the seeds of hope be sown in the hearts of the people and the youth in the technology sector of the country.
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