Iran Internet Censorship Research
Understanding how internet censorship works is essential for building effective countermeasures and educating at-risk users.
DNS Blocking
DNS blocking prevents users from resolving domain names to IP addresses. When you type a website address, the DNS query is intercepted and returns a blocked response or redirects to a warning page.
Deep Packet Inspection
DPI examines the content of network packets, not just headers. This allows censors to identify and block specific protocols, applications, and even keywords within encrypted traffic metadata.
Protocol Filtering
Common VPN and proxy protocols are often fingerprinted and blocked. Standard OpenVPN, WireGuard, and other widely-used protocols may be detected and filtered at the network level.
Research Goals
IranVPN research documents these techniques in plain language, studies their evolution, and informs the development of more resilient access tools — always with user safety as the primary constraint.