2008-11-19 Iran blocks access to more than five million websites

2008-11-19  Telegraph.co.uk \Iran\war on the internet\moral damage http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/3483844/Iran-blocks-access-to-over-five-million-websites.html Iran blocks access to more than five million websites Iran blocks access to more than five million websites  "The enemies seek to assault our religious identity by exploiting the internet," Abdolsamad Khoram Abadi, an adviser to Iran's prosecutor general, was quoted by Kargozaran newspaper as saying. The internet "inflicts social, political, economic and moral damage, which is worrying," he said, adding that "social vice caused by the internet is more than that by the satellite network," Mehr news agency reported. With about 21 million users, the internet is widely popular in Iran, which information ministry officials say ranks among the top 20 user countries. In recent years, internet service providers have been told to block access to political, human rights and women's sites and weblogs expressing dissent or deemed to be pornographic and anti-Islamic. Yet another example of "moral damage" being used as an excuse by powermongers to shut down the tools of citizen empowerment.

&ldquo;Iran has blocked access to more than five million internet sites, whose content is mostly perceived as immoral and anti-social, a judiciary official was has said.&rdquo;   