Iran executed a coordinated nationwide internet shutdown in January 2026 during protests, affecting 90 million people for over 120 hours. BGP routing data reveals a sophisticated, multi-stage attack: routing updates spiked from 1.2 million to 5.6 million daily as 10 major networks simultaneously destabilized. The regime deployed deep packet inspection to block VPNs and encrypted messengers, completely severed IPv6 connectivity, reduced IPv4 peer visibility by 82%, and deployed military GPS jammers to disable Starlink satellite connections. Forensic analysis using OONI probes, RIPE data, and BGP monitoring exposed a three-stage kill chain of inspection, injection, and traffic blackholing.

5m read timeFrom state-of-iranblackout.whisper.security
Post cover image
Table of contents
A Nation Connected
896 Impressions