Iran loses Gmail access as national intranet is launched

Authorities in Iran have blocked access to the Google e-mail service Gmail, while the Google search engine is only working with limited functionality. ‘Google and Gmail will be filtered nationwide, and will remain filtered until further notice,’ Abdul Samad Khoramabadi, an adviser to Iran’s public prosecutor’s office, said on Sunday. Meanwhile, the first government agencies have been connected to the state’s national intranet which is being set up as a closed system to contain only officially approved local content. The government has pointed out that it has no plans to block access to the normal World Wide Web altogether.