On 8 January 2026, the Iranian authorities imposed a near-total communications shutdown. It was the nation’s first full info blackout: For weeks, the web was off throughout all provinces whereas providers together with the government-run intranet, VPNs, textual content messaging, cell calls, and even landlines had been severely throttled. It was an unprecedented lockdown that left greater than 90 million people minimize off not solely from the world, however from each other.
Since then, connectivity has by no means absolutely returned. Following U.S. and Israeli airstrikes in late February, Iran once more imposed near-total restrictions, and folks contained in the nation once more noticed international info flows dry up.
The unique January shutdown got here amid nationwide protests over the deepening financial disaster and political repression, wherein tens of millions of individuals chanted antigovernment slogans within the streets. Whereas Iranian protests have turn out to be frequent lately, this was probably the most important uprisings because the Islamic Revolution in 1979. The federal government responded shortly and brutally. One report put the demise toll at more than 7,000 confirmed deaths and greater than 11,000 beneath investigation. Many sources consider the demise toll may exceed 30,000.
13 days into the January shutdown, we at NetFreedom Pioneers (NFP) turned to a system we had constructed for precisely this type of second—one which sends recordsdata over abnormal satellite tv for pc TV indicators. In the course of the nationwide info vacuum, our know-how, referred to as Toosheh, delivered real-time updates into Iran, providing a lifeline to tens of millions starved of trusted info.
How Iran Censors the Web
I joined NetFreedom Pioneers, a nonprofit targeted on anticensorship know-how, in 2014. Censorship in Iran was a defining function of my youth within the Nineteen Nineties. After the Islamic Revolution, most Iranians started to steer double lives—one at residence, the place they might drink, dance, and select their clothes, and one other in public, the place everybody needed to adjust to stifling authorities legal guidelines.
Iran’s web infrastructure is extra centralized than in different elements of the world, making it simpler for the federal government to limit the move of data. Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Getty Photos
My first expertise with secret communications was once I was 5 and dwelling within the small metropolis of Fasa in southern Iran. My uncle introduced residence a satellite tv for pc dish—dangerously unlawful on the time—that allowed us to tune into 12 satellite tv for pc channels. My favourite was Cartoon Community. Then, throughout my teenage years, this identical uncle launched me to the web by way of dial-up modems. I bear in mind utilizing Yahoo Mail with its 4 megabytes of storage, studying information from world wide, and studying concerning the Chandra X-ray telescope from NASA’s web site.
That openness didn’t final. As web use unfold within the early 2000s, the Iranian authorities started reshaping the community itself. Not like the extremely distributed networks in the USA or Europe, the place hundreds of suppliers trade site visitors throughout many impartial routes, Iran’s connection to the worldwide web is comparatively centralized. Most worldwide site visitors passes by way of a small variety of gateways managed by state-linked telecom operators. That structure offers authorities uncommon leverage: By limiting or withdrawing these connections, they will sharply scale back the nation’s entry to the skin world.
Over the previous decade, Iran has expanded this management by way of what it calls the National Information Network, a domestically routed system designed to maintain knowledge contained in the nation every time potential. Many authorities providers, banking methods, and native platforms are hosted on this inner community. In periods of unrest, entry to the worldwide web could be throttled or minimize off whereas parts of this home community proceed to perform.
The federal government started its censorship marketing campaign by redirecting or blocking web sites. As web use grew, it adopted extra refined approaches. For instance, the Telecommunication Company of Iran makes use of a method referred to as deep packet inspection to investigate the content material of knowledge packets in actual time. This technique allows it to establish and block particular sorts of site visitors, equivalent to VPN connections, messaging apps, social media platforms, and banned web sites.
The Stealth of Satellite tv for pc Transmissions
Toosheh’s communication workaround builds on a historical past of satellite tv for pc TV adoption in Center Japanese and North African nations. By the early 2000s, satellite tv for pc dishes had been frequent in Iran; as we speak the vast majority of households in Iran have entry to satellite tv for pc TV regardless of its official prohibition.
Not like subscription providers equivalent to DirecTV and Dish Community, “free-to-air” satellite tv for pc TV broadcasts are unencrypted and could be obtained by anybody with a dish and receiver—no subscription required. As a result of the indicators are open, customers also can seize and retailer the info they carry, slightly than merely watching it dwell. Tech-savvy individuals realized that they might use a digital video broadcasting (DVB) card—a bit of {hardware} that connects to a pc and tunes into satellite tv for pc frequencies—to rework a private pc right into a satellite tv for pc receiver. This fashion, they might watch and retailer media regionally in addition to obtain knowledge from devoted channels.
Many Iranian residents have free-to-air satellite tv for pc dishes, like those on this condominium constructing in Tehran, and might thus obtain Toosheh transmissions, giving them a lifeline throughout web blackouts.Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Getty Photos
Toosheh, a Persian phrase that interprets to “knapsack,” is the brainchild of Mehdi Yahyanejad, an Iranian-American technologist and entrepreneur. Yahyanejad cofounded NetFreedom Pioneers in 2012. He proposed that the satellite-computer connections enabled by a DVB card might be re-created in software program, eliminating the necessity for specialised {hardware}. He added a easy digital interface to the software program to make it straightforward for anybody to make use of. The following breakthrough got here when the NFP workforce developed a brand new switch protocol that tips abnormal satellite tv for pc receivers into downloading knowledge alongside audio and video content material. Thus, Toosheh was born.
Satellite tv for pc TV makes use of a file system referred to as an MPEG transport stream that enables a number of audio, video, or knowledge layers to be packaged right into a single stream file. Whenever you tune in to a satellite tv for pc channel and choose an audio choice or closed captions, you’re accessing knowledge saved in numerous elements of this stream. The NFP workforce’s perception was that, by piggybacking on one in every of these layers, Toosheh may ship an MPEG stream that included paperwork, movies, and extra.
HOW TOOSHEH WORKS: At NetFreedom Pioneers, content material curators pull collectively recordsdata—information articles, movies, audio, and software program [1]. Toosheh’s encoder software program [2] compresses the recordsdata right into a bundle, in .ts format, creating an MPEG transport stream [3]. From there, it’s uploaded to a server for transmission [4] through a free-to-air TV channel on a Yahsat satellite tv for pc that’s positioned over the Center East to offer regional protection [5]. Satellite tv for pc receivers [6] straight seize the info streams, that are downloaded to computer systems, smartphones, and different units, and decoded by Toosheh software program [8].Chris Philpot
A satellite tv for pc receiver can’t inform the distinction between our knowledge and regular satellite tv for pc audio and video knowledge because it solely “sees” the MPEG streams, not what’s encoded on them. This implies the info could be downloaded and skim, watched, and saved on native units equivalent to computer systems, smartphones, or storage units. What’s extra, the system is totally non-public: Nobody can detect whether or not somebody has obtained knowledge by way of Toosheh; there aren’t any traceable logs of consumer exercise.
Toosheh doesn’t present web entry, however slightly delivers curated knowledge by way of satellite tv for pc know-how. The elemental distinction lies in the best way customers work together with the system. Not like conventional web providers, the place you kind a request into your browser and obtain knowledge in response, Toosheh operates extra like a mixture of radio and tv, presenting info in a magazine-like format. Customers don’t make requests; as an alternative, they obtain 1 to five gigabytes of prepackaged, fastidiously chosen knowledge.
Entry to info shouldn’t be solely about information or politics, however about publicity to potentialities.
Throughout this yr’s web blackout, we distributed official statements from Iranian opposition chief Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi and the U.S. authorities. We offered first-aid tutorials for medics and injured protesters. We despatched uncensored information stories from BBC Persian, Iran Worldwide, IranWire, VOA Farsi, and others. We additionally shared vital software program packages together with anticensorship and antisurveillance instruments, together with how-to guides to assist individuals securely connect with Starlink satellite tv for pc terminals, permitting them to remain protected and nameless as they despatched their very own communications.
How one can Fight Sign Interference
As a result of Toosheh depends on one-way satellite tv for pc broadcasts, it evades the standard ways governments use to dam web entry. Nevertheless, it stays weak to satellite signal jamming.
The Iranian authorities is infamous for deploying sign jamming, particularly in bigger cities. In 2009, the federal government used uplink interference, which assaults the satellite tv for pc in orbit by beaming robust noise within the frequency of the satellite tv for pc’s receiver. This makes it unimaginable for the satellite tv for pc to differentiate the data it’s presupposed to obtain. Nevertheless, as a result of this kind of assault briefly disables the complete satellite tv for pc, Iran was threatened with worldwide sanctions and in 2012 stopped utilizing the strategy .
A graph of community connectivity in Iran exhibits that on 9 January 2026, web entry dropped from practically one hundred pc to 0. Samuel Boivin/NurPhoto/Getty Photos
The present technique, referred to as terrestrial jamming, makes use of antennas put in at increased elevations than the encircling buildings to beam robust noise over a particular space within the frequency vary of family receivers. This assault is efficient in conserving a few of the packets from arriving and damaging others, successfully jamming the transmission. Nevertheless it’s short-range and requires important energy, so it’s unimaginable to implement nationwide. There are all the time individuals someplace who can nonetheless watch TV, obtain from Toosheh, or tune right into a satellite tv for pc radio regardless of the jamming. Even so, we needed a workaround that might preserve our transmissions broadly accessible.
NFP’s resolution was so as to add redundancy, related in precept to a data-storage approach referred to as RAID (redundant array of impartial disks). As a substitute of sending every bit of knowledge as soon as, we ship further info that enables lacking or corrupted packets to be reconstructed. Below regular circumstances, we frequently use 5 % of our bandwidth for this redundancy. In periods of energetic jamming, we enhance that to as a lot as 25 to 30 %, enhancing the possibilities that customers can recuperate full recordsdata regardless of interference.
From Disaster Response to Public Entry
Toosheh initially got here on-line in 2015 in Iran and Afghanistan. Its full potential, nonetheless, was first realized through the 2019 protests in Iran, which noticed essentially the most widespread web shutdown previous to the blackout this yr. Wired referred to as the 2019 shutdown “essentially the most extreme disconnection” tracked by NetBlocks in any nation by way of its “technical complexity and breadth.” Our know-how helped hundreds of individuals keep knowledgeable. We despatched essential native updates, legal-aid guides, digital safety instruments, and impartial information to satellite tv for pc receivers all around the nation, seeing a sixfold enhance in our consumer base.
When that wave of protests subsided, the federal government allowed some communication providers to return. Individuals had been once more in a position to entry the free web utilizing VPNs and different antifilter software program that allowed them to bypass restrictions. Toosheh then turned a public entry level for information, instructional materials, and leisure past authorities filtering.
Toosheh’s affect is commonly private. A touring instructor in western Iran informed NFP that he often distributed Toosheh recordsdata to college students in distant villages. One bundle included footage of feminine athletes competing within the Olympic Video games, one thing by no means broadcast in Iran. For one younger lady, it was the primary time she realized ladies may compete professionally in sports activities. That second underscores a broader fact: Entry to info shouldn’t be solely about information or politics, however about publicity to potentialities.
The Price of Toosheh
Not like internet-based methods, Toosheh’s operational price stays fixed whatever the variety of customers. A single TV satellite tv for pc in geostationary earth orbit, deployed and maintained by a global firm equivalent to Eutelsat, can broadcast to a complete continent with no enhance in price to audiences. What’s extra, the startup price for customers isn’t excessive: A satellite tv for pc dish and receiver in Iran prices lower than US $50, which is inexpensive to many. And it prices nothing for individuals to make use of Toosheh’s service and obtain its recordsdata.
We intention not simply to construct a instrument for censorship circumvention, however to redefine entry itself.
Nevertheless, working the service is dear: NetFreedom Pioneers pays tens of hundreds of {dollars} a month for satellite tv for pc bandwidth. We had obtained funding from the U.S. State Division, however in August of 2025, that funding ended, forcing us to droop providers in Iran.
Then the December protests occurred, and broadcasting to Iran turned an pressing precedence. To show Toosheh again on, we would have liked roughly $50,000 a month. With the help of a handful of personal donors, we had been in a position to meet these prices and maintain operations in Iran for a number of months, although our future there and elsewhere is unsure.
Satellites In opposition to Censorship
Toosheh’s revival in Iran got here alongside NFP’s ongoing help for deployments of Starlink, a satellite tv for pc web service that enables customers to attach on to satellites slightly than counting on home networks, which the federal government can shut down. Not like Toosheh’s one-way broadcasts, Starlink gives full two-way web entry, enabling customers to ship messages, add movies, and talk with the skin world.
In 2022, we began gathering donations to purchase Starlink terminals for Iran. We’ve delivered greater than 300 of the roughly 50,000 there, enabling residents to ship encrypted updates and movies to us from contained in the nation. As a result of the know-how is banned by the federal government, entry stays restricted and carries threat; Iranian authorities have just lately arrested Starlink customers and sellers. And in contrast to Toosheh’s receive-only broadcasts, Starlink terminals transmit indicators again to orbit, making a radio footprint that may doubtlessly be detected.
The web shutdown in Iran continued after the assaults by Israel and the USA started in late February, stopping Iranians from speaking with the skin world and with each other.Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu/Getty Photos
Trying forward, we envision Toosheh turning into a foundational a part of international digital resilience. It’s uncensored, untraceable, and immune to authorities shutdowns. As a result of Toosheh is downlink solely, it may well typically really feel onerous to clarify the worth of this know-how to these dwelling within the free world, these accustomed to open web entry. But, individuals dwelling beneath censorship have few different selections when there’s a digital blackout.
At the moment, NFP is growing new options like clever content material curation and mechanically prioritizing knowledge packages based mostly on geographic or situational wants. And we’re experimenting with native sharing instruments that enable customers who obtain Toosheh broadcasts to redistribute these recordsdata through Wi-Fi hotspots or different offline networks, which may lengthen the system’s attain to catastrophe zones, battle areas, and climate-impacted areas the place infrastructure could also be destroyed.
We’re additionally different use instances. Following the Taliban’s return to energy in Afghanistan, NetFreedom Pioneers designed a satellite-based system to ship instructional supplies. Our aim is to allow non-public, large-scale distribution of coursework to anybody—together with the women who’re banned from Afghanistan’s colleges. The system is technically prepared however has but to safe funding for deployment.
We intention not simply to construct a instrument for censorship circumvention, however to redefine entry itself. Whether or not in an Iranian metropolis beneath surveillance, a Guatemalan village with out web, or a refugee camp in East Africa, Toosheh provides a strong and sensible mannequin for delivering very important info with out counting on weak or costly networks.
Toosheh is a reminder that innovation doesn’t must imply complexity. Generally, essentially the most transformative concepts are the only, like delivering knowledge by way of the sky, quietly and affordably, into the fingers of those that want it most.
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