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A Weapon of Mass Communication
This article was originally published on Family Security Matters. View Original Article 
We must begin to react faster and smarter than countries like Iran, who are blatantly threatening us with their nuclear weapons development and support of lethal terrorist organizations. They are committed to our demise, and it is time that we more effectively utilize some unconventional technological weapons to thwart their efforts.
Terrorists and repressive governments such as Iran have adopted and mastered the Internet and are becoming increasingly reliant on it. As the creators and developers of the Internet, developed countries should have the assets and technical capability to use these tools in a more effective manner to secure our safety and national security.
Although the Internet had been enjoying steady adoption in Iran, increasing from 250,000 users in 2000 to over 7.5 million today, the Iranian government has recently begun an aggressive campaign aimed at stepping up its control of the Internet. They have begun a campaign to control what users in Iran can see online in a direct attempt to curb the influence of western culture. The government’s actions provide us with a glimpse of their fear with regard to the free flow of information, thereby exposing a vulnerability.
The Internet is a commercial and social communication network whose adoption rate has never declined even the in face of repressive governments. We must use this tool to more effectively reach younger individuals, who are generally the most amenable to political change, and to engage and expose them to our values and beliefs. The intent is not to impose our values and beliefs on this audience, but simply to display them as an alternative to their existing political system. The Iranian younger generation appears to be open and willing to consider such alternative options.
The Iranian government’s recent notable increase in Internet censorship and content filtering along with a new edict restricting Internet speed reveals their concerns and vulnerability. The government’s actions make it more challenging for Iranians to download large Internet files such as music and western movies, which their government claims is a primary cause undermining their younger generation’s opinions and attitudes. With recent studies indicating that 70% of the Iranian population is 30 years old or younger, we should help that population get access to unfiltered information so that they are better equipped to make informed decisions about the direction of their life and the world.
At a recent speech by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at a university in Tehran, the Iranian news agency INSA reported that an estimated 50-60 student protestors “set fire to his pictures, kicked the car transporting him away and threw firecrackers”. This was the first reported hostile protest since Ahmadinejad took office. Although the protests were small and there were responses by supporters of the President, he was forced to shorten his speech and leave earlier than expected. According to published reports, the President responded to chants from the protestors who shouted “death to the dictator” by saying, "today the worst type of dictatorship in the world is the American dictatorship which has been clothed in human rights. Our students are free and they fight and die, but do not accept the foreigners' mission or bend to them.” Recently, under the leadership of Ahmadinejad, many politically active students and professors opposed to his presidency are reported to have been banned from taking classes or teaching at universities in Iran. These students, one of whom has been quoted as saying “We only want freedom of expression,” are an important asset to our success in promoting freedom.
The Iranian government, like other repressive governments and terrorist organizations, has a love-hate relationship with the Internet. They love the freedoms and anonymity it provides to them, but hate that it does the same for the masses they want to control. In short, leaders of repressive governments are taking advantage of the Internet for themselves, while working to restrict their population’s access to the free flow of information out of fear that they will lose the support and control of their people. Traditional media, such as television, radio and print have long been controlled in Iran and other repressive countries, and those restrictions often prove difficult for the West to bypass on a massive scale. The Internet is a very different information and news medium, which we must take full and swift advantage of.
Circumventing censorship on the Internet is manageable and the tools are beginning to emerge for that to happen easily and more seamlessly. We must fund, embrace and encourage their continued and immediate development and deployment. Fortunately for advocates of freedom, recent data from ISNA reveals that the average Iranian person trusts the Internet more than any other media outlet, including domestic television and radio broadcasts. The Internet is a potent tool which we have to use more effectively, or it may become our very undoing, as groups determined to harm us use it more effectively to meet their goals and missions.
Wherever information is filtered, but access to the Internet exists, residents have shown a desire and willingness to elude government filtering in order to have choice of information. We can help them. For instance, on December 1, 2006, a new open software solution named Psiphon was released by The Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, at the University of Toronto. According to their homepage, Psiphon is designed to “Help Trusted Friends and Family Members Surf the Net Freely and Securely.” It also states that Psiphon “allows citizens in uncensored countries to provide unfettered access to the Net through their home computers to friends and family members who live behind firewalls of states that censor.”
It is free software that enables users to create private social networks and provides a “web proxy”, allowing for “censorship circumvention.” With Psiphon software, the government cannot see the sites that the user is visiting. Further, the software is designed to make it difficult to determine when a user is using Psiphon, which means it is more difficult for governments to block its implementation. Solutions like this are important vehicles that enable us to open communications and ensure that people have access to uncensored information.
We must accept that our adversaries will use the Internet and other emerging technologies as a primary means of organizing, communicating, recruiting, and disrupting; and so must we. Subversive groups are intent on harming us, and they are inherently anti-corporate and anti-freedom. The Internet and emerging technologies used immediately and effectively may prove to be a pivotal tool in winning the ideological war with Iran and undermining the efforts of terrorist organizations to expand their ranks.