Iran to launch initial stage of national internet in August

Iran's Minister of Communications and Information Technology Reza Taqipour said Monday that Iran is set to launch the pilot and first phases of its national Internet project in late August, local Press TV reported.

The project's "Phases Zero and One" would be completed and be operational in late August, Taqipour was quoted as saying.

Taqipour added that the national Iranian Internet will initially offer 8 Mb high speed broadband Internet for home users. The customers will have 20 Mb of bandwidth when the next phases of the national Internet network come on stream, said the minister.

On June 22, Taqipour said the project's "Phase Zero" would be launched and become operational within the next two weeks, said Press TV.

"This project will be tested on some users until its next phases become operational," he said.

Also known as the "Clean Web," the initiative seeks protection against the loose commitment to ethics and morality across the World Wide Web.

Tehran has also undertaken a project to develop a national search engine dubbed "Ya Haq" by early 2012, which can be accessed through the domestic internet.

According to a New York Times article on June 12, the U.S. State Department has initially issued a 2-million-U.S.-dollar grant for developing the "Internet in a briefcase" technology that would allow dissidents to circumvent the restrictions of repressive regimes around the world by making internet networks portable across borders.

Source: Xinhua