Iran’s internet blackout has now surpassed ten consecutive days, with Cloudflare Radar data confirming that HTTP traffic from the country remains well below 1% of pre-shutdown levels, effectively severing approximately 90 million Iranians from the global internet.
The near-total blackout began around 07:00 UTC on February 28, 2026, coinciding with joint US and Israeli military strikes across Iran. Cloudflare Radar recorded a near-instantaneous 98% collapse in internet traffic, with HTTP requests plunging to the floor across all major Iranian regions.
Independent internet monitor NetBlocks confirmed the shutdown was government-enforced, not a result of any cyberattack or infrastructure damage.
The drop was swift and deliberate. Traffic data from Cloudflare shows all three key metrics, total bytes, HTTP bytes, and HTTP requests, collapsing simultaneously at the same timestamp on February 28, with no recovery in the days that followed.
Regional and Network-Level Impact
The shutdown is near-universal across Iranian territory. Among Iran’s top five regions by traffic share, Tehran dominates at 65%, followed by Fars (7.9%), Isfahan (6.8%), Razavi Khorasan (4.8%), and Alborz Province (4.2%).
Traffic from all five regions flatlined to near zero from March 1 onward, indicating a centrally coordinated shutdown rather than isolated disruptions.
At the autonomous system level, the three largest Iranian ISPs bear the most visible impact. AS197207 (MCCI) accounted for 46.6% of Iran’s pre-shutdown traffic, followed by AS44244 (IranCell) at 25.7% and AS58224 (TCI) at 11.4%. All three networks went dark simultaneously, pointing to direct action at the national infrastructure layer.
By March 9, NetBlocks reported the blackout had reached 216 hours, its tenth day, with connectivity still measured at approximately 1% of ordinary levels.
As of March 10, the shutdown crossed the 240-hour mark, making it one of the most severe government-imposed nationwide internet shutdowns recorded globally and the second longest in Iran’s own history, after the January 2026 blackout triggered by anti-government protests.
Iran has now spent roughly one-third of 2026 offline. The Iranian Minister of Communications acknowledged that the shutdown carries an economic cost of $35.7 million per day, while online sales have dropped by as much as 80%.
Human Rights Watch has condemned the blackout as a direct violation of fundamental rights, warning it also escalates civilian risks by blocking access to emergency information.
State-affiliated media confirmed that only pre-approved websites on Iran’s domestic National Information Network remain accessible.
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