https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/permanent-ban-ipv6-forced-nat...
A few weeks ago a very clever way to bypass the SNI whitelist was introduced [1] (SNI spoofing for cloudflare!) but it was subsequently blocked. Some claim that at this moment all outbound TCP connections are terminated inside the firewall / ISPs and therefore methods like [1] based on injecting fake or problematic TCP packets no longer work. It seems like even SYN-free TCP connections (again, breaking protocol) are no longer accessible.
Also there is no point to lie about this
https://karat.substack.com/p/a-diplomatic-suitcase-at-imam-k...
But this is also an example of weird absolutist thinking about military tactics: is it unbeatable? No. Does it complicate the surveillance and detection picture? Yes.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/29/world/middleeast/us-preci...
But look at all our self-proclaimed enemeies (eg Cuba, North Korea, Saddam Hussein's Iraq, Iran) and all of that end of becoming a varying degree of autocratic. None of these countries ends up wanting to be a US puppet. I can't think of a single example where foreign inteference (or war) has had the citizenry welcome foreign powers as liberators or otherwise increased freedoms or conditions in a country for those citizens.
You might be tempted to say apartheid South Africa but there's a key difference. South Africa wasn't an enemy. It was an ally. Sanctions don't work on enemies. They only work on allies.
However unpoular the IRGC or the Supreme Leader are in Iran, the US and Israel are less popular. We should never forget that the Ayatollah is a direct product of US inteference as we couped their democratically elected government to install a brutal regime under the Shah. Look up the history of SAVAK some time.
That's one of the lines people spew as if it is a tautology without actually thinking about its accuracy. Germany, France, Japan, South Korea, need more examples?
Iranians right now also tend to disagree with you too...
Panama
A counter-argument could be that sanctions, when overused[0], weaken that very point by reducing this interdependence.
[0] This is not an opinion on whether or not they are currently overused.
That's just wishful thinking on your part. Every iranian i speak to curses their regime and praise trump and netanyahu. Their level of support for the people bombing their country is incredible.
I just don't know if those civilians will trust you. They have plenty of reasons not to.
>Last year, the Iranian government passed legislation that made using, buying or selling Starlink devices punishable by up to two years in prison. The jail term for distributing or importing more than 10 devices can be up to 10 years.
EDIT: To provide more context: Let's say that "John" is arrested for having had "illegal internet access" (not even owning a starlink). Even if he has a trial, the prosecutor can, and will, argue that he could have used his a secure channel to collaborate with the Mossad and CIA. If they find any unfavorable social media posts on his phone (and believe me, they will) they will say that he has endangered the national security by encouraging unrest and violent protests. This would then amount to waging war against God and death penalty.
If his phone is so clean that they don't find anything, it must be the fact that he is an agent, a mercenary. They will torture him until he confesses to having collaborated with Mossad. They will then air a forced confession on TV.
John might get lucky and have a caring family member from IRGC. In that case you might be right, he will only receive a prison sentence. If he had had a higher ranking IRGC family member he could even go further and start selling his starlink VPN for around $5 / GB. It's not even a hypothetical situation, I had to buy one of these (and it indeed was a starlink connection) four weeks ago ...
"Iran Prepares Death Penalty Law for Starlink Internet Use"
https://iranwire.com/en/news/145471-iran-prepares-death-pena...
For those who don't keep track of backbone ISP topologies: Iran has 3 or 4 major entirely government controlled ASNs which all domestic ISPs are obligated to be downstream of.
The government controlled AS run all the international transit connections (at the BGP level) and also the physical fiber/longhaul DWDM systems into a few neighboring countries. It makes it very easy to cut off all the downstream domestic only ISPs.
It is to prevent hacking and tracking by US and Israel of what is going on over there, it is defensive since it has been shown that Iran's connected infrastructure is thoroughly compromised.
Chinese government don't care about small percent of population accessing open internet.
There is no doubt that CIA has access to Starlink, that's a massive amount of crucial intel right there in battlefront.
well... so obvious
Due to widespread protests and an attempt to crack down on coordination. This chain of events was widely reported.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Internet_blackout_in_Iran
You might also have to consider the propaganda campaigns the US could run against an Iranian population with web access. If the population isn't more discontent now than it already was, "secretly" replacing commercial ad placements on western websites with US propaganda when the requests come from Iranian sources could make them discontent or inflame them further, which is bad for the Iranian government.
Remember when Ukraine used the Russian cellular internet to operate drones that destroyed numerous Russian heavy bomber aircraft? That’s what the US/Israel would logically be expected to do if there were wide open internet access in Iran.
This is obvious game theory playing out militarily, people only see political suppression but warfare is a totally different ballgame.
If China were waging large scale war on the US I’d expect the exact same countermeasures to happen.
