Iran’s minister of culture and guidance called for the easing of restrictions on web access by the Committee for the Determination of Criminal Content.

ISNA reports that Ali Jannati said on Tuesday December 31 that there needs to be a reconsideration of the restrictions on access to social networking sites.

“They need to reconsider and not consider everything as criminal content,” Jannati said.

He stated that the Supreme Council of Cyber Space is a better option for monitoring web activity. The Supreme Council of Cyber Space is led by the president, while the Committee for the Determination of Criminal Content is headed by the Prosecutor General.

The new reformist government of Hassan Rohani has been trying to ease restrictions on web access in Iran.

Jannati commented on the recent blocking of WeChat, saying for example that many ministers were saying that rather than filtering the whole site, they could only filter the harmful parts such as “Nearby.”

The Nearby icon allows users to identify users that are nearby, which according to Iran’s minister of communications could “allow users to enter people’s private space.”

Radio Zamaneh