Iran’s government is set to permanently block the immensely popular Telegram Messenger messaging service by April 20, according to a statement by a government official cited by Mehr News Agency on March 31.

Dubai-headquartered Telegram Messenger, created by self-exiled Russian Pavel Durov, has become Iran’s most used mobile application in recent years with some 40 million people, or roughly one-half of the country’s population, or four-fifths of Iranians with Internet access, now using it. The cloud-based app, which provides encryption, has repeatedly been threatened with closure by the Iranian judiciary with Durov being put on trial in absentia for facilitating protests via Telegram’s software. During the height of the winter street demonstrations movement in Iran, a temporary ban was placed on both Instagram and Telegram from December 30 to January 13. 

Aleaddin Boroujerdi, chairman of the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee of the Islamic Consultative Assembly of Iran, announced the ban during a radio interview, the news agency reported. He reportedly said the rumours of a upcoming prohibition were true and that the application would be blocked in just over three weeks’ time.

Boroujerdi said that the decision to block the Telegram app was “made at the highest levels of government” and suggested that a domestically developed software called Soroush would be its replacement.

He added that he hoped people would move to the Iranian-developed messaging service when the block was put in place. However, several Iranians have claimed on social media that the app was developed by the Iranian intelligence services and is not trustworthy.

The loss of Telegram, which boasts some opposition diaspora channels, would be a big blow to those who have already met disappointment in efforts to push the Rouhani administration to reopen platforms including Twitter, blocked since they featured in the organisation of protests in 2009. 

Crptocurrency nerves
The announcement about the banning of Telegram comes following February 1 comments from the head of Iran’s Passive Defence Organisation, Brigadier General Gholamreza Jalali, who said the decision by Telegram to push ahead with its initial public offering (or “initial coin offering”, or “ICO”) of its cryptocurrency, the Gram, was a significant challenge for the Iranian government.

Telegram has so far raised more than €850mn from its ICO and announced on April 1 that it would push towards its target of more than €1.25bn in the next few weeks.

Jalali, while noting Telegram’s massive presence on the local messaging market—its messaging traffic market share is reckoned to reach up to 95%—was also critical of the enterprise's messaging app for its adverse impact on society in general. Authorities, he said, were startled by the prospect of the Gram, which was set to be launched with the offer of $20mn “Whale” blocks of coins. It could “affect jobs in Iran to the point where we can no longer have any cooperation with our banks,” he remarked.

The general went so far as to claim that Telegram’s Russian CEO Durov—reported by Bloomberg in December to have settled in Dubai after three years roaming the globe—sells Iran’s Big Data to adversaries of Iran. “The owner of Telegram does not receive payments for the app’s services... so to earn money, he sells our data to those countries which need it to monitor and analyse Iran,” he said.

Clients for “our data stored in Telegram" include “special clients” such as the US intelligence agencies, Iranian enemies of the Islamic Republic and Israel, he added.

Telegram faces further opposition from Russia
On March 20, Telegram was hauled up in front of the Russian Supreme Court which rejected a plea by the enterprise not to be ordered to hand over the encryption keys that would allow Russia and its allies access to all messages sent on the platform.

Durov was defiant and tweeted: "Threats to block Telegram unless it gives up private data of its users won't bear fruit. Telegram will stand for freedom and privacy."

The Russian telecom watchdog Roskomnadzor notified Telegram it had 15 days to comply with Russian legislation.

The ruling came as part of Russia’s broader campaign to get state access to electronic data about users in general. There is currently debate over the controversial Yarovaya law that would force websites to keep data about Russian users on servers that are physically present in Russia, while email and phone companies would be required to keep copies of messages and conversation for six months in an order that could add billions to costs.