Partial Internet Restoration in Iran Confirmed by Cloudflare Radar Data

Cloudflare Radar data indicates a partial restoration of the Internet in Iran, following a nearly three-month-long shutdown. The shutdown began on February 28, and traffic levels fell to well under 1% of previous levels. However, starting at around 11:00 UTC on May 26, Cloudflare Radar observed a marked increase in both traffic and DNS queries, with a brief spike at 11:45 UTC followed by a steady increase starting at 12:00 UTC. This surge in activity is roughly 15x than the levels observed during the prior week.

Key Technical Details:

• Traffic increase: 15x higher than prior week levels
• DNS query increase: significant upward trend, indicating more users are requesting websites and services
• Traffic volume by region: 91.6% of HTTP requests originated from Tehran
• Traffic volume by network: increases observed for Internet providers TCI, IranCell, RighTel, and MCCI
• Traffic has returned to 40% of previous levels

Practical Implications for Developers:

• The partial restoration of the Internet in Iran may indicate a temporary return to normalcy, but it's essential to monitor network activity over the coming days to determine if traffic levels will successfully return to their pre-shutdown baselines.
• Developers should be aware of the potential for temporary changes in network activity and adjust their applications and services accordingly.
• The increase in DNS queries and traffic may indicate a higher volume of data moving across Cloudflare's network, which could impact application performance and latency.