Blackout For 5 Days And Counting: Why Iran Is Threatening Anyone Who Tries To Get Online

Last Updated:March 05, 2026, 16:55 IST

Iran's internet blackout has surpassed 120 hours. The situation has grown more alarming with reports that the blackout is now being actively enforced.

Iran’s internet blackout has now exceeded 120 hours, with connectivity still flatlining at around one percent of ordinary levels, leaving most Iranians struggling to access independent news or communicate with the outside world, internet monitor Netblocks said.

Iranian authorities shut off internet access on Saturday after Israel and the United States began air strikes, plunging the country into a near-total information blackout.

“Iran’s internet blackout has now exceeded 120 hours with connectivity still flatlining around 1 percent of ordinary levels," Netblocks said in a post on social media platform X.

Threats, Texts And Illegal Satellites

The situation has grown more alarming with reports that the blackout is now being actively enforced. Netblocks said Iranian telecoms companies were sending messages to “threaten users who try to connect to the global internet with legal action"- a sign that authorities are attempting to close even the narrow windows of connectivity that some Iranians have managed to find.

Some residents are finding brief moments during the day when they are able to connect and send messages. Others have resorted to using illegal Starlink subscriptions, the satellite-based internet service owned by Elon Musk.

Calls to Iran from overseas- whether to mobile phones or landlines- are described as near-impossible. Under normal circumstances, Iranians rely heavily on VPNs to access Western internet services such as Instagram, which are banned inside the country.

Helping Strangers, Fleeing Without Maps

For those with any working connection, the priority has become getting information to those without. Shima, a 33-year-old in Tehran, told AFP she was using her connection to relay news of life in the capital- which has been hit by repeated missile and bombing strikes since Saturday- to friends and family elsewhere.

“I need to call a lot of people, even strangers, on behalf of their families," she said.

On Iran’s borders, the blackout is creating a different kind of danger. Weary travellers fleeing to safety say they have been forced to make their journeys without any internet connection or access to phone navigation services such as Google Maps.

This is not the first time Iran has weaponised internet shutdowns against its own population. Authorities cut access for several weeks during mass nationwide protests in January and again during the twelve-day war with Israel last June.

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