It seems that the three members of the Joint Commission on Protection, famous for their conversation with the Peace Line magazine, say that the virtual space has no law and we want to make it the owner of the law; Of course, Lotfollah Siahkali, the spokesperson for this commission, whose full name is “Commission for the Study of the Plan to Support the Rights of Users and Basic Services of the Virtual Space,” speaks to the Peace Line that the initial plan was protection and it has been moved about three times and changed more than eighty percent. What this plan is and what it will eventually be is a problem; But when the Minister of Communications says that security institutions access data with the order of special judges appointed by the head of the judiciary, (1) regardless of whether the mentioned minister has thought to alleviate concerns with this statement or not, it seems that one should be concerned about the outcome of this plan.

Some representatives, including Mehrdad Goodarzvand Chegini, another member of the Joint Commission for Safeguarding, believe that this plan should be brought to the open session of the parliament and discussed there. Chegini, however, spoke of peace and said that he had only attended one meeting of this commission and was unable to attend afterwards; he even requested a replacement, but that did not happen. On the other hand, Gholamhossein Rezvani, another member of this commission, told the magazine Khat-e-Solh that “some have explicitly stated that our intention in further examination is to suspend the complete approval.” According to Mr. Rezvani, this goes against the philosophy of passing a law.

Discussions about the approval of this plan are extensive. However, this report attempts to follow the issue from the perspective of members of the Parliament’s Supervision Commission and see what their opinions are and how much it aligns with the reality of the proposed plan. In this regard, a peace line has been established with Mr. Gholamhossein Rezvani, representative of Tehran, Lotfollah Siahkali, representative of Qazvin, and Mehrdad Goodarzvand Chegini, representative of Rudbar. These three representatives of the 11th Parliament and members of the Joint Supervision Commission have been interviewed and the quotes are from these three individuals.

No one knows what this plan is!

Goudarzoon Chagini, one of the absentees of the voting session on the “General Principles of the Virtual Space Regulations Plan,” says, “This plan must be returned to the parliament to determine what it is fundamentally.” He says, “It is in the open session of the parliament that opinions should be expressed.” The spokesperson of the commission also says that this plan has been changed two or three times and he himself was against the initial plan. Gholamhossein Rezvani, who is one of the supporters of this plan, but says, “The majority of the parliament has voted twice for this plan to be reviewed in the Joint Commission based on Article 85 of the Constitution.” He says that whatever is approved in the parliament has the force of law and therefore the objections of the opponents are meaningless; but apparently all the representatives agree that they have voted for exactly which version. Sayed Ali Yazdikhah, a member of this commission, has stated

Designers and opponents; from research centers to members and non-members of the joint commission.

The designers of this plan are members of the Cultural Commission of the Parliament. Siahkali, the spokesperson of the commission, speaks in favor of the peace plan. On the other hand, reports name four individuals as the creators of this plan: Abbas Moradi, Sina Kaleh, Masoud Fayyazi, and Rouhollah Mo’men-Nasab. Two of these individuals have a history of working at the Parliament’s research center, and the other two are either part of the national virtual space or members of the Islamic Revolution Front in the virtual space. (3) The point here is that the Parliament’s research center itself is against this plan. In a letter to the chairman of the special commission for reviewing the plan to protect the virtual space, the center, while listing numerous flaws in the plan, requested more time to amend it and mentioned issues such as the decrease in institutional social capital, creation of instability in economic laws and regulations, endangerment of investment security,

One of the most vocal opposition members, Jalal Rashidi Kouchi, is also a member of the 11th Parliament’s Virtual Space Regulation Commission. He openly considers this plan as the birth of an absolute dictatorship in the virtual space; a plan that, even within the commission, only has one opposing member while the rest have seemingly removed the responsibility from their shoulders by absenting themselves during the approval of the plan’s general outlines. This opposing member, who according to reports, has cast a neutral vote, claims to have been the only opposition member present during the commission’s session. Masoumeh Pashaei Bahram, the representative of Jolfa and Marand in the 11th Parliament, has declared herself as the only opposing member of this plan and has stated that opposing the principle of the plan’s 85th article is a matter of safeguarding and that the virtual space should not be restricted. News of her neutral vote has been published, but she herself

Origin 85, Yes or No!

Part of Article 85 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran states that the Parliament can delegate the power to enact certain laws to its internal commissions, while observing Article 72, in cases of necessity. In this case, these laws will be implemented on a trial basis for a period determined by the Parliament, and their final approval will be with the Parliament. Gholam Hossein Rezvani, a supporter of this plan, says that the legal steps for the adoption of this plan have been completed. According to him, the majority of the Parliament has voted twice for this plan to be considered by the Joint Commission, based on Article 85 of the Constitution. Regardless of how these “cases of necessity” have been identified, Masoumeh Pashaei Bahram, the only opponent of the plan in the Joint Commission, has stated reasons that can challenge the presence of this plan in the Joint Commission.

First of all, despite the importance of this plan, why is it not being transparent with the people?

Secondly, representatives say “it is a heavy plan and takes up the time of the parliament. Again, it must be said that if this plan is important, why don’t we allocate a 24/7 transparent budget for it?”

The third issue is about the expertise of the plan. Pashayi Bahram says, “Unless a specialized commission should review the plan and bring it to the court after being hammered? We could have given the specialized commission two months to complete the expertise work.”

According to Masoumeh Pashaei-Bahram, the fourth reference is to the previous experience, namely the Youth Plan and Principle 85, which, according to her, does not accelerate the work and leaves room for the infiltration of external interested individuals.

And fifthly, entrusting the project to twenty-three people who sometimes become members without having the necessary expertise and do not regularly attend meetings is a big mistake. (7)

Of course, Ma’soumeh Pashaei Bahram herself joined the joint commission after these flaws and, according to her interpretation, became the only opponent of the conservation plan.

And as for the supporters; from the speaker to the members of the joint commission.

نمی‌دهیم

We do not give them cash.

It was previously mentioned that supporters do not agree on which version of the plan they have agreed upon; the spokesperson of the joint commission also announces that the plan is not about protection, but rather about regulating regulations. Siahkali says that this plan is supposed to define the responsibilities of a regulatory body for the virtual space. According to him, the name of this body is “High Commission for Regulating Regulations of the Virtual Space in the Supreme Council of the Virtual Space.” These regulations also define the structure of this commission, which is supposed to write regulations for the virtual space, according to the spokesperson of the joint commission. However, Gholamhossein Rezvani speaks in more detail. He says that the opponents are not being respected or considered. He says that nothing has been approved yet and only generalities have been discussed. He continues, “We are supposed to have a law in this regard. When it is still unclear what will be approved, what are they complaining about

About the content of the plan that these two representatives, along with seventeen others, voted in favor of, there are many discussions. Both Siahkali and Rezvani rejected many speculations about this plan.

Siahkoli has said in the peace line that there is no discussion about foreign platforms and how to review them in this plan. Rezvani also responds to a question about the model of this plan and the possibility of it being Chinese, saying that the model of this plan is similar to Iran; of course, he has said in the peace line that nothing has been approved yet; it is a preliminary draft and the only thing that has been approved is its generalities; but Rezvani defends filtering with all his might. He has said in the peace line that opponents say, “Why do they twist the audience? If the intention is filtering, whenever necessary, it will be filtered, and it will be filtered.” According to him, the issue of filtering exists everywhere in the world. “Whenever it is necessary for governments, they do and will do it. Iran is not an exception to this law”; of course, he did not say which countries, according to him

Representative of Tehran and member of the Commission for Safeguarding, in response to a question regarding the issue of national internet and intranet, says that we do not have the ability to separate from the outside space and we both provide services to the outside space and receive services from it. He even promises that bandwidth problems will be solved and the bandwidth of domestic and foreign internet will increase. In his opinion, all filtering and blocking, including the blocking of Telegram, has been due to the lack of a law, and now by legalizing the virtual space, these problems will be solved. However, Gholam-Hossein Rezvani does not mention that according to Pavel Durov, the CEO of the Telegram messaging system, after rejecting the request for cooperation from Iranian authorities in the first stage of “spying on citizens” of this country, this network was blocked in Iran for a few hours, but then unblocked; (8) an action that was confirmed three

With these details and examples, it is clear that it can be extended to many filtering in the past two decades and after the introduction of home internet to Iran, Siahkali, Razavani and other defenders of the protection plan do not say where these trends were illegal that now the “necessary” need for law has been found. If these trends were illegal, why are they not reversed and filters are not lifted and software like Telegram is not available to citizens (without the need for a filter breaker)? The same can be traced in the case of filtering Facebook, Twitter and the complete shutdown of the internet in November 2019 and what happened in Khuzestan in July 2021.

The issue of the supporters is clear. Ali Jadi, a representative of the parliament and a member of the oversight commission, had previously stated that one of the issues of this plan is “obligating foreign social networks to open an office and introduce a legal representative in Iran.” According to him, non-Iranian applications must comply with the laws of the Islamic Republic of Iran “and respect the cyber sovereignty of the host country.” Gholam Hossein Rezvani also speaks of peace, saying that they may cut off their service to Iran and create unemployment, so we must make the space lawful and strengthen the domestic network; but this is only a reminder of the negotiations of the former Minister of Communications with the CEO of Telegram and the request for “spying on citizens.” Negotiations with Pavel Durov did not yield results; they want to operationalize the same content with domestic laws.

Why a joint commission?

Why has a joint commission been formed for this matter? Lotfollah Siahkali, the spokesperson for the joint commission, gave a response to the peace talks that could be a way to answer this question. He said that we were chosen because we are familiar with the virtual space and we write laws that are not inflammatory. According to him, there are also some experts in the commission who have modified the initial proposal. He continues, “We have been tasked with conducting a more comprehensive review with the help of our knowledge and other friends who have expertise. That is our philosophy.”

The inflammation that Mr. Spokesman of the Commission mentions is likely the same protests that have taken place in recent months regarding this plan and the threat of internet restrictions in Iran. In fact, by changing the initial plan, which had specific provisions, to a plan that is supposed to create a legislative body for the virtual space, the pursuit of the same demands of the initial plan has been pursued, this time in a separate and closed institution. When the articles of the plan are not discussed in the open session or in the commission, where the negotiations are broadcasted audibly and visually, the opponents will only be faced with the result when the work is done and everything has been approved and implemented. The decision-making behind closed doors for the virtual space is what Rashidi Kouchi, the representative of the eleventh parliament, has called “an absolute dictatorship in the virtual space.”

The story still remains.

The news first comes that the elimination of the protection plan in the parliament is being rejected, (13) but a few days later, Ahmad Hossein Fallahi, a member of the Joint Commission on Protection and a proponent of the plan, says that “with the decision of the Supreme Council of Virtual Space, the parliament will soon put the protection plan of the virtual space on its agenda to draw a law and framework for this space”; (14) meaning that the story continues. A plan that aims to restrict users, identify users who produce and publish content other than what the ruling system wants, and establish security control over the virtual space in Iran, but at every step it faces popular resistance; a plan that the residents of Baharestan do not want to pass in the public arena of the parliament and in front of the eyes of citizens. At first, they referred it to a limited commission, and now the Supreme Council of Virtual Space and the decision from above determines its fate. Ali

Notes:

1- Minister of Communications: People should feel comfortable about protecting their personal data / Security institutions can access data with the order of special judges appointed by the head of the judiciary, Online Trust, 23 Esfand 1400.

2- The protection was approved, but the representatives themselves do not know what they have approved, Entekhab News and Analysis website, March 3rd, 1400.

3- Who are the designers behind “Protecting the Virtual Space”? Ali Soudai, BBC Persian, 10 August 2021.

4- What is the reason for the opposition of research centers to the protection plan of the virtual space?, Economy News, 1 Dey month 1400.

5- Video/ Jalal Rashidi Kouchi, representative: “The Protection Plan” is the birth of an absolute dictatorship in the virtual space, Entekhab website, 14 Esfand 1400.

6- Masoumeh Pashaei: I was the only one against the protection plan in the commission meeting/ The plan should be brought back to the public session of the parliament, Fardanews website, 5 Esfand 1400.

7- Pashaei Bahram: Entrusting the protection of users’ rights to twenty-three individuals is a big mistake!, Imna News Agency, 7 August 2021.

8- Telegram was temporarily blocked after not cooperating with the Iranian government, BBC Persian, August 19, 2015.

9- It was brought up on the sidelines of the government meeting; Jahromi: Negotiations with the Telegram manager are valid, Mehr News Agency, 2 May 2018.

10- Is Telegram filtered?/It is natural to impose restrictions, ILNA news agency, 10 Dey 1396.

11- Boroujerdi mentioned: Telegram will hand over its place to a national system by the end of Farvardin, Mehr News Agency, 11 Farvardin 1397.

12- Serious talk with Ana: Foreign social networks are required to operate legally in Iran, Ana News Agency, 16 Azar 1400.

13- The removal of the maintenance plan in the parliament is gaining momentum, Triangle News and Analysis website, 21 Esfand 1400.

14- Falahi: The parliament will soon put the protection plan on the agenda, according to the decision of the Supreme Council of Virtual Space, Fars News Agency, 25 Esfand 1400.

15- What were the demands of the esteemed leader in the virtual space and where did they lead to?, Young Journalists Club, 16 Esfand 1396.