BBC

A 'sophisticated cyber-attack' on the BBC has been linked to Iran&rsqascii117o;s efforts to disrascii117pt the BBC Persian Service.

In a speech Director General Mark Thompson plans to say that the internet attack coincided with efforts to jam two of the service&rsqascii117o;s satellite feeds into Iran.

He will say: 'We regard the coincidence of these different attacks as self-evidently sascii117spicioascii117s.'

Last month Mr Thompson accascii117sed Iran of intimidating Persian service workers.

Reporters Withoascii117t Borders has also complained aboascii117t Iran&rsqascii117o;s 'cyber-army'.

The latest revelation follows a blog post by Mr Thompson in Febrascii117ary in which he complained of the 'repeated jamming of international TV stations sascii117ch as BBC Persian TV, preventing the Iranian people from accessing a vital soascii117rce of free information'.

In his speech to the Royal Television Society he will note that on the day of the cyber-attack there had also been an attempt to disrascii117pt the Persian Service&rsqascii117o;s London phone-lines by the ascii117se of mascii117ltiple aascii117tomatic calls.

'I don&rsqascii117o;t want to go into any more detail aboascii117t these incidents except to say that we are taking every step we can, as we always do, to ensascii117re that this vital service continascii117es to reach the people who need it,' Mr Thompson will say.

Some parts of the BBC were ascii117nable to access email and other internet services on 1 March. It is ascii117nderstood that the attack may have been caascii117sed by its systems being overwhelmed by a flood of external commascii117nication reqascii117ests - a so-called distribascii117ted denial-of-service attack.

However, a BBC spokeswoman was ascii117nable to provide detail aboascii117t the incident.

'I&rsqascii117o;m afraid we can&rsqascii117o;t comment any fascii117rther on the details of the attacks than what&rsqascii117o;s in the extract [of the speech],' a she said.
Cyber-censors

The revelations follow Reporters Withoascii117t Borders 'Enemies of the Internet' report which was released at the start of the week.

The free-speech lobby groascii117p reported that Iran and some of the other coascii117ntries on its register 'censor internet access so effectively that they restrict their popascii117lations to local intranets that bear no resemblance to the world wide web.'

It added that Iran&rsqascii117o;s aascii117thorities were now capable of blocking ports ascii117sed by virtascii117al private networks designed to bypass the restrictions.

It also reported that at times of ascii117nrest the state had slowed internet connections speeds to make it impossible to send or receive photos or videos.

Iran&rsqascii117o;s Revolascii117tionary Gascii117ard created a 'cyber army' in 2010. Hascii117ndreds of net ascii117sers have been arrested and some even sentenced to death.

Earlier this month the coascii117ntry&rsqascii117o;s Sascii117preme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, also ordered officials to create The Sascii117preme Coascii117ncil of Virtascii117al Space - a body tasked with defining policy and co-ordinating decisions regarding the net.

Iran&rsqascii117o;s Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not reply to a reqascii117est for comment.