Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 16
By Umid Niayesh- Trend:
At least 100 hackers have been arrested in Iran over the last month, according to a spokesman of the Islamic Republic's police.
The hackers arrested by Iran's cyber police were mainly active on the mobile messaging application Telegram, Saeed Montazer al-Mahdi from the ISNA news agency reported.
He further noted that some 20 "immoral" groups in Telegram have been blocked during the one-month period, adding that the administrators of the groups have been arrested and handed over to the justice entities.
He also underlined that the cyber police have no telegram channel, adding that the police had arrested the administrators of a Telegram group claiming to have links with the cyber police.
Recently, Iran's security entities have intensified monitoring and control over mobile messaging applications, including Telegram, which is significantly popular in the Islamic Republic.
In a tweet on Oct. 20, Pavel Durov, the head of Telegram, claimed to have turned down the Iranian Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Ministry's request to provide the ministry "with spying and censorship tools," though he later withdrew the claim.
Earlier in November, Mohammad Reza Farnaghizadeh, the head of the Public Relations Office at Iran's ICT ministry, informed Trend that Telegram must prevent "immoral" content from being published in order to continue operating in Iran.
"If any social media platforms, including Telegram, aim to continue their activities in Iran, they must abide by our regulations as well as red lines and remove any pages carrying immoral content," he emphasized.
In recent months, Telegram, which functions as a messaging and content sharing application, has become popular among Iranians who use it to communicate with each other and also share content, such as pornography and political satire. Several Iranian government-controlled news agencies have also embraced the platform, using it to advertise their stories.
Currently, at least 13 million Iranians use Telegram, according to the Islamic Republic's ICT ministry.
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