Iran went into an internet blackout on Saturday after Israel and the US launched military strikes across the country, according to a global internet monitor.
Within hours of the attacks – which officials said targeted infrastructure and killed dozens of senior regime figures at a complex in Tehran – NetBlocks CEO Alp Toker confirmed that connectivity was starting to ‘flatline’.
“Iran’s internet connection is now at around the 1% level, so the original blackout imposed by the regime that morning has been consolidated,” he confirmed.
“The blackout was imposed just after 7:00 UTC, not long after the attack on Iranian regime premises,” Toker clarified, adding that Iran had been largely offline for about 12 hours after the attack.
“At 06:10 UTC there is the strike on the main line; at 07:10 UTC the telecommunications disruption starts; at 08:00 UTC the blackout is largely in effect; and at 08:30 UTC the connectivity lines are down.”
“National wartime blackouts are extremely rare around the world, and it’s something we’ve only really seen on this scale in Iran,” he said.
President Donald Trump monitors US military operations in Iran following an Israeli attack in Tehran on Saturday, February 28, 2026. (@WhiteHouse/X)
In the aftermath of the attack, dubbed Operation Epic Fury, President Donald Trump said on Truth Social that the “heavy and precise” bombing campaign in Iran “will continue uninterrupted for the week or as long as necessary to achieve our goal of PEACE THROUGHOUT THE MIDDLE EAST AND INDEED THE WORLD!”
He claimed that Iranian security forces and members of the regime’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were already seeking immunity. He urged them to “peacefully merge with the Iranian patriots.”
“We hear that many of their IRGC, military and other security and police forces no longer want to fight and are seeking immunity from us,” Trump said in the post. “As I said last night, ‘Now they can have immunity; later they only get death!'”
Toker argued that the timing of the blackout suggested it was deliberately imposed as the regime sought to secure communications for fear of further attacks.
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TEHRAN, IRAN – FEBRUARY 28: Smoke rises over the city center after an Israeli army launches the second wave of airstrikes on Iran on February 28, 2026. (Photo by Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu via Getty Images) (Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“The Iranian regime will have deployed this new blackout to counter potential cyber attacks during their own military operation, but also to prevent the locations of senior regime figures from leaking through metadata and user-generated content,” he said.
“Communications would have been limited, and the Iranian leadership would have operated on the assumption that all communications, including satellite or whitelist networks, carry risks,” he said, before claiming that “paranoia at this point would be well-founded, with the blackout being a belated but immediate response.”
“Those participating directly would already know to avoid technology that could give away their whereabouts,” Toker said.
“However, the metadata may well have played a role in determining that the meeting of regime leaders took place at the Tehran complex, who was present and at what time.”
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In this handout image provided by the Office of the Supreme Leader of Iran, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei addresses the nation in a state television broadcast on June 18, 2025 in Tehran, Iran. (Office of the Supreme Leader of Iran via Getty Images)
Toker revealed that the wider network around the regime’s leaders and around the compound would not have had the same strict restrictions.
“This type of adjacent ‘background noise’ can be correlated with other intelligence sources to gain insight into activities on the ground,” he added.
“Smartphones are a readily available, almost ‘free’ source of intelligence, and even when locked, they ultimately connect to international online services and generate insights that can be used to locate regime figures,” Toker said.
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“In the aftermath of Saturday’s strike, these concerns will have been high on the minds of the remaining Iranian leaders, especially if they did not have a clear and specific understanding of how the meeting came to be compromised.”
Iran has previously imposed sweeping internet shutdowns during periods of civil unrest, including nationwide protests in January that killed thousands of people, often seeking to curb the spread of information and limit coordination.
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