U.S. Seizes 36 Iranian Websites Including State-Run Media

(Bloomberg) -- The U.S. has seized three dozen Iranian websites, according to a U.S. official, in a move likely to inflame tensions ahead of nuclear talks in Vienna expected to resume next month.

A message appeared on several Iranian state-run news websites claiming they were “Seized by the United States Government” in a joint law enforcement action between the FBI and the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security.

The web domains affected include the English-language news network Press TV and Arabic-language channels Al-Alam News and Al-Kawthar TV.

A statement by the Islamic Republic of Iran News Network said the move appeared to be part of a larger-scale crackdown by the U.S. on news websites linked to what Iran calls the “Axis of Resistance,” which includes Syria, Hezbollah, some Iraqi militias and Hamas.

The U.S. official didn’t provide further details. The U.S. State Department directed questions to the Justice Department, where officials didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. The seizure was reported earlier by outlets including Fox News.

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The U.S. in October seized 92 domain names it said were used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps to engage in global disinformation efforts. Four of those sites “purported to be genuine news outlets,” the Justice Department said in a statement at the time.

That earlier effort began with intelligence provided by Google, the Justice Department said at the time, and ultimately represented a collaborative effort between the search engine company, Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc.

Tuesday’s seizure is likely to add new tension to the next round of nuclear negotiations, expected to take place in Vienna in the coming weeks, on reviving the 2015 nuclear agreement with world powers that former President Donald Trump abandoned in 2018.

The U.S. and Iranian officials have reported progress in the first six rounds of those talks, which are taking place through intermediaries including Russia and France. But mistrust remains high, and the talks were further roiled by hard-liner Ebrahim Raisi’s victory in Iran’s presidential elections last week.

Raisi has demanded an end to U.S. sanctions and says the country won’t give up its ballistic-missile capabilities, something the U.S. says should be up for discussion later on should the two countries go back into compliance with the nuclear accord known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

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