Page 49 - IRANRptAug20

“amber zones”.
Another 2,521 new cases of COVID-19 infection have been reported in the
country, raising the total number of infections to 262,173.
9.1.6 ​TMT sector news
Iran sees three-fold y/y increase in mobile imports in four months
Telegram to create proxies to work in Iran
ICT minister unveils Iran ‘Netflix’ plan
The Islamic Republic of Iran Customs Administration (IRICA) has said the country saw a three-times increase in legal mobile phone imports to the country over the four months to March 21, IBENA News Agency reported on July 5.
According to the rules of Iran, all mobile phones must be imported through official channels and registered on a national database. The strict move is seen as a way to stem the flow of grey and black-market smartphones coming into the country mostly via the United Arab Emirates and Iraq.
According to an IRICA official, some 2.4mn phones were imported in the four-month period, which is a 300% increase on the same period of 2019. Seyyed Ruhollah Latifi, a spokesman for the IRICA, said: "Contrary to the claims of some people with different intentions in the media, the official statistics of mobile phone imports show From the beginning of the year 1399 to the 15th Tir, 2.49mn mobile phones with 918 declarations have been cleared from the country's customs and entered the market.”
He added that imports of mobile phones in the same period of last year, totalled 864,208, with a total value of $73mn, according to the official exchange rate of IRR42,000 to the dollar.
Latifi said: "With this volume of mobile phone imports, there should be no problem with the supply of mobile phones in the market."
Co-founder of the encrypted Telegram instant messaging service, Pavel Durov, said on his channel on June 22 that the company plans to create proxy servers to work in Iran where it is hindered by official efforts to block it.
The mysterious Durov has previously said discussions took place with the Iranian government to get the app unblocked, but that the conversations ended when he refused to share user data with the Iranian Intelligence Service. Despite the current filtering of the app in Iran, it remains the most popular such application after WhatsApp, which is accessible but open to so-called man-in-the-middle snooping, according to Durov’s statements made on previous occasions.
Durov called on Telegram company employees to pay attention to "those countries where Telegram is still blocked at the state level, such as Iran and China."
"We ask the admins of the former proxy servers for Russian users to focus their efforts on these countries. They should also stand ready for new challenges," the billionaire added.
Russia’s Roskomnadzor watchdog said on June​ ​19 it would lift its ban on using Telegram​ ​in the country following a decision cleared with the general prosecutor.
Iran’s information and communications technology (ICT) minister has announced a new internet protocol television (IPTV) project to get 5mn Iranian households connected to internet television and video-on-demand services, according to ISNA.
The flagship plan comes as part of a package of measures aimed at increasing Iranian usage of technology through the National Information Network (NIN),
49​ IRAN Country Report August 2020 www.intellinews.com