Iran to implement ‘cyber identity document’ for internet users

The document, entitled “Authentic Identity System in Cyberspace,” is meant to develop and promote digital business and to allow for “free, healthy, dynamic, responsible and beneficial interactions with respect for individual and collective rights in social, economic and political relationships between all kinds of entities in cyberspace,” stated the council during the meeting.

The Council has stated in previous meetings that a valid identity system in cyberspace is necessary for “any kind of technical, economic (monetary and financial), cultural, social, political and administrative interaction between individuals, groups, objects, services, content and locations.”

How this document will be implemented is unclear. It is also unknown if the plan will only be implemented on the National Information Network or on all Internet Service Providers.

Minister of Communications Mahmoud Vaezi stated that identifying internet users was a “current priority” and that in the future there would be no anonymous internet users in Iran, according to Radio Farda.

The purpose of identifying internet users is to “classify individuals into groups of professors, universities, students, business and other guilds to manage the needs of each group,” according to the Ministry of Communications.

Vaezi explained that the national network of government information services is provided to the public and authentication prevents the need for a national ID card.

Iran’s National Information Network (ININ) is an intranet system that the country is working on in an attempt to cut the Islamic Republic’s dependency on international cyberspace, according to Radio Farda.

The Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution announced that the ININ is 80% complete in May.

The plan was first announced in 2010 with an expected completion date in 2015.

“All domestic activities, services, applications [and] various types of contents… are included in the national internet,” said Communications and Information Technology Minister Mahmoud Vaezi at the inauguration event in 2016, according to the BBC.

Iran already has blocked access to tens of thousands of sites and services including Twitter and Facebook, although many users use virtual private networks (VPNs) and proxy sites to bypass the filter.

“The National Internet Project could pave the way for further isolation, surveillance and information retention,” stated a report by the British human rights campaign group Article 19, according to the BBC. “[It] risks severely isolating the Iranian people from the rest of the online world, limiting access to information and constraining attempts at collective action and public protest.”