For the past four days, amid unprecedented protests that have set Iran's streets ablaze, the Iranian regime has almost completely cut off internet access across the country.
In June, shortly after the Israeli army attacked Iran, the authorities had also taken similar measures. How did the Iranian authorities manage to disconnect the country from the global internet?
Two internet network specialists, Frédérick Douzet, a professor at the French Institute of Geopolitics (IFG), and Kavé Salamatian, a professor at the Savoie-Mont-Blanc University, answered Le Monde's questions on the matter in June 2025, in this republished interview.
Is the scale of the shutdown unprecedented?
Frédérick Douzet: Iran had already implemented a shutdown of this scale in November 2019, to suppress protests against rising fuel prices. The goal was to censor information and control the population. However, this is the first time that Iran has enacted such a large-scale shutdown for national security reasons, as a means of defending itself against an attack.
