Iran Blocks Facebook

The government of Iran has blocked access to Facebook in what’s widely considered to be a political move. Facebook has been added to the Iranian block list in advance of the presidential elections next month.

People have speculated that the ban on Facebook is an attempt to undermine presidential challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi. Mousavi is a former prime minister of Iran and is seen as a potential threat to current president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Mousavi is reportedly popular with the younger more reform minded Iranians – who are just the sort of people likely to use Facebook. The ban is widely seen as an attempt to limit his ability to campaign effectively.

Assuming this is a political move then it could well backfire on Ahmadinejad. The ban has given Mousavi masses of worldwide publicity as well as links to his Facebook page. Since the younger people are more likely to know ways of circumventing the block it might end up working in Mousavi’s favour. As I write this he has 5740 Facebook supporters – I expect that number to grow substantially.

Update: Apparently Iran has now restored access to Faceboook. Maybe they realised how much publicity they were giving Mousavi.