Iran’s panicked regime moves to criminalise ordinary contacts with the outside world

The Islamic Republic has for years been the target of extensive and highly effective Israeli intelligence penetration. Key nuclear facilities were hit by mysterious acts of sabotage in 2020 and 2021, while numerous other unexplained security breaches occurred over the years. Perhaps the most extraordinary was the November 2020 assassination of senior nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, reportedly carried out using a remotely operated weapon.

The scale of the penetration became even clearer during Israel's June 2025 air campaign and the joint US-Israeli operations of 2026. The two allies repeatedly demonstrated detailed knowledge of the whereabouts of senior Iranian military and civilian officials, including Khamenei himself. Dozens of important figures across key institutions were killed in targeted strikes. Some had reportedly moved to safe houses or the homes of relatives, yet Israeli intelligence was apparently able to locate them and direct precision strikes against the apartments or sections of buildings where they were staying.

Critics of the proposed legislation argue that instead of addressing such high-level security failures, the authorities are casting an extraordinarily wide net over ordinary Iranians. One anonymous Iranian account on X summarised the implications sarcastically: “Under parliament's new law, emailing a foreign professor or university is a crime. Applying to a foreign university is a crime. Receiving funding is a crime.”

The same post continued: “Having an embassy appointment is a crime. Writing a recommendation letter for a student is a crime. Studying or working abroad is a crime.”

It concluded by pointing to the potential implications for academics: “Having a degree from a foreign university is a crime. Citing foreign academic papers is a crime. Submitting a paper to an international conference or journal is a crime... It's literally a madhouse.”

Reports that the legislation could also permit prolonged detention of suspects without trial have added to concerns about its scope. Critics note that the intelligence used by Israel and the United States to locate highly protected officials could hardly have come primarily from ordinary students, artists or citizens communicating with people abroad.

As another Iranian wrote on X: “Infiltration is carried out through people with greater access to classified information – that is, senior political and security officials, not students, artists or ordinary citizens.”

Some Iranian commentators abroad argue that the leadership is now at least as concerned about another wave of domestic unrest as it is about the external military threat. They point to the near-daily execution of dissidents and increasingly restrictive security measures as evidence of that fear. The killing of tens of thousands of protesters on January 8 and 9 brought the mass demonstrations to an abrupt end, but with economic conditions continuing to deteriorate sharply, another outbreak of unrest cannot be ruled out.

The proposed legislation would give the authorities considerably broader tools to control the flow of information between Iran and the outside world. Article 6 would criminalise interviews, participation in discussions or “any form of communication” with media outlets designated as “hostile,” including US and Israeli media and outlets funded by either country. The proposed punishment is a prison sentence of more than six months to two years.

The provision could potentially encompass Persian-language broadcasters based abroad. Even contact with other foreign media would have to be registered through an Intelligence Ministry system, with failure to report such communication carrying the same proposed punishment.

Article 7 goes further. It would criminalise sending videos, photographs, audio recordings or “any data” to non-Iranian media or individuals engaged in media activities abroad. Penalties would become more severe during periods the legislation describes as “crisis, unrest or disorder,” or when authorities determine that information was provided under a cooperation agreement or with the intention of acting against national security.

If enacted with its current wording, the provision could reach far beyond professional journalists. An ordinary citizen who records a demonstration, security crackdown or other event inside Iran and sends the footage to a news organisation abroad could potentially fall within its scope.

The larger significance of the legislation lies in its expansion of the concept of “infiltration.” Espionage traditionally involves obtaining or transmitting classified or security-related information on behalf of a foreign government or intelligence service. The proposed legislation extends potential criminal liability to media interviews, academic cooperation, civil-society activities, cultural work, training programmes and other forms of contact with foreign institutions.

For now, however, these provisions are not yet law. Parliament has approved only the general outlines of the legislation, and individual articles may still be amended or rejected before the bill passes through the remaining legislative process.

Even so, its direction is unmistakable. Rather than narrowly targeting foreign intelligence networks, the proposed law could create a sweeping new legal framework for controlling how millions of Iranians communicate with the outside world. Coming after devastating intelligence breaches at the highest levels of the Islamic Republic, the response appears less focused on finding the insiders who enabled those failures than on treating ordinary contact with the outside world itself as a potential security threat.

Mardo Soghom is a former deputy editor and regional director for West Asia at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty