Warning and concern about the disruption of online businesses in the event of permanent Instagram filtering

Site managerSeptember 28, 2022

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A board member of the Iranian Internet Business Association says that the lives of eleven million people in the country are completely dependent on Instagram, and the constant filtering of this network "removes them from the sphere of profit."

Reza Olfatnasab told Etemad Online that the fact that officials are not clarifying whether the platform shutdown process will continue after the "current crisis" has made the situation "worrying" for online businesses.

He is referring to the disruption of the internet and the blocking of the popular networks Instagram and WhatsApp in Iran under the pretext of street protests following the killing of Mahsa Amini by police violence, which has resulted in the cutting off of citizens' access to these two platforms across Iran.

Referring to the continuation of this situation, Mr. Olfatnasab warned that given that many businesses have been formed on the Instagram platform today, "filtering and cutting off those people working in this sector will deprive them of their benefits and cut off their income."

He called the "important issue" the attempt by some to continue blocking these two networks, especially Instagram, even after the "settlement" of street protests, and described this action as "very dangerous."

This online business activist added: "Because, according to statistics announced by the Secretary of the Supreme Council for Cyberspace, about two million and 500 thousand businesses in Iran are active on this platform and have advertisements and sales."

He added that with many "offline" businesses entering Instagram after the coronavirus pandemic, the network "has become much more important than in previous years, and it seems that economic security will be undermined if this situation continues."

According to the Etemad newspaper, available statistics show that the share of online commerce has increased from 1.3 percent of the country's total trade in 2017 to five percent in 2021.

The report states that, regardless of Iranian users' high trust in Instagram, "WhatsApp has become so popular and widespread today that it has penetrated the fabric of all economic activities" in Iran.

This is while the "Economic World" newspaper wrote that it appears that the Islamic Republic's authorities intend to keep these two networks permanently blocked, just like Telegram.

Source: Radio Farda

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