Iran, a country very near the top of Reporters Without Borders “Internet Enemies” list, is renowned for its sophisticated filtering system. Most of the top social networks are blocked and, according to Freedom House’s 2012 report, the Iranian authorities believe that Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are working in collaboration with intelligence services such as the CIA and Mossad.

Update:

On December 15, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei tweeted the link to his new Facebook account. It was opened on December 13 and although the page had 1777 'likes' when we first visited it two hours ago, it's now topped 3,500 likes and is growing at a rate of around 200 likes per 10 minutes.

But one wonders whether his team expected the amount of banter that would be posted to his wall. There was a diverse range of both positive and negative commentary posted to the page. HA Med and Reza Ram expressed support for the Supreme Leader posting "Live long and be successful my Leader" and "My Leader, may God protect you".

A direct couplet posted by a young woman called Neda reads, "Khamenei is an ass / one of his hands is lame". And yes, it does rhyme in Persian. Facebook is blocked in Iran, meaning that ordinary users must use circumvention tools to access the social network. Edris Khodayi asks, "Sir, which VPN do you use?"

Original story:

The Iranian regime frequently issues statements urging the Iranian people to be wary of the  “soft war” being waged against the revolutionary ideology through social networks, but it seems that Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, has exempted himself from such warnings. The Supreme Leader’s official website is available in more than 10 languages and his PR team is very active on social networks. At the time of writing Ayatollah Khamanei’s Twitter feed had 7,044 followers and 3178 tweets in English and Farsi. Perhaps not surprisingly, the Supreme Leader’s account follows nobody!

Khamenei has always been very vocal about his opposition to social networks. On 16 September 2010 he chastised Twitter and the American government in a formal speech:

“Last year, amid the sedition movement [the protests after the 2009 presidential elections], we heard that one of the social networks [Twitter], which was reporting the news from here, issuing commands from there, and encouraging the protesters to get out in the streets, wanted to shut down for maintenance [but] the American government blocked their way and said that if you do this now, it will harm the Iranian opposition movement, so they were forced to postpone the repairs”

Twitter is not the only social network that Khamenei is using. Recently, he joined Instagram and his team use the feed to distribute official images from Ayatollah Khamenei’s official website. The Ayatollah was previously active on FriendFeed, but his profile is no longer available.

In an interview published by Hamshahri Magazine Group on 3 December 2010, the editor of Khamanei’s website stated,

“It began last year when social networks weren’t very popular, we reserved the username “khamenei.ir” on Twitter and FriendFeed. Because khamenei.ir is a key source of reference for informing the media and people about the leader’s opinion on specific issues, the administrators of Khamenei’s website use these tools due to their emphasis on speed of delivery”.

Although Ayatollah Khamenei frequently discourages the use of technology, it is playing an increasing role in the maintenance of his public profile. On 10 October 2012 when Khamenei travelled to visit Bojnourd, Esfarayen and Shirvan, three cities in the province of North Khorasan, his team used Google Maps to map out his journey.

It seems there are two sets of rules at play in Iran. The Supreme Leader willingly exploits technology for the benefit of his public image campaign, yet in formal speeches and statements broadcast across the country and internationally he warns the Iranian people to be wary of succumbing to exploitation through technology, which he links strongly to the West, vice, and ‘invasion’. When asked to justify his use of the social networks he frequently chastises, the Supreme Leader’s response is to clarify that using tools promulgated by the West is equal to fighting behind enemy lines.