Ahmadinejad's Fear of the Internet

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At the same time, the entire international media are now relying on material from amateur sources—material which was once viewed with much skepticism—because there are hardly any other images coming out of the country and the world is desperate to see what is happening on the ground.

Admittedly photo agencies have already been using amateur shots for some time. Reuters, for example, operates the platform YouWitness, while Getty Images recently teamed up with Flickr, the mother of all photo platforms. Photo agencies using amateur pictures generally take great pains to make sure that the photographers are really who they say they are, and that the picture actually shows what it claims to be showing. This makes the agencies more reliable—but also much slower. Compared to the overflowing sources of the so-called social media, fact-checked news appears to be moving in slow motion.

Unverifiable Citizens' Journalism

Even German TV stations, which are subject to the same strict limitations as other media, can no longer get by without using YouTube, Flickr, Twitter and other sites when reporting on the Iran protests.

Internet video footage is particularly important at the moment for the German news channel N24, says the station's editor-in-chief, Peter Limbourg. "We told our correspondent on Monday to completely stop reporting, in order not to put herself in danger," he told Spiegel Online. As a result, the station is now short of footage and is forced to make up the shortfall by using material taken from news agencies, YouTube and social networks. "However, we cannot prove the authenticity of the material," said Limbourg.

Neither the material from the Internet nor from Iranian state television reports can be independently verified, says Burkhard Wennemar, an editor on the foreign desk of the commercial German TV station RTL. Nevertheless, he says, "media such as YouTube are becoming increasingly important for reporting in such cases," adding that it is essential that it is pointed out in reports that information from, say, Twitter is not verifiable.

"At the demonstrations, every second person has a mobile phone in their hand and is taking pictures," journalist Antonia Rados, who is reporting from Tehran on behalf of RTL, told Spiegel Online. "It's incredible." At the protests, the mobile phone network frequently goes down after half an hour, she explains.

"We are following the discussions on the social networks very carefully," Elmar Thevessen, the deputy editor-in-chief of the public German TV station ZDF, told Spiegel Online. "Images are only used if we are able to determine authenticity." In exceptional cases, and only in when the contents are highly plausible, the network said it uses images if supporting material from multiple source can be found that seems to corroborate the events. In such cases, he said it was essential to disclose that the authenticity of those images could not be 100 percent verified. Decisions on whether particular footage can be used or not, he said, are made by senior editors.

Peter Mezger, a correspondent for German public broadcaster ARD, has not been allowed to leave his hotel room in Tehran for several days. His reports currently rely on footage from Iranian state television, with other material coming from agencies, archives, or from the Internet. Karola Baier from the foreign desk of Bayerischer Rundfunk, which is part of ARD, says that they would naturally prefer to use original footage, but at the moment there is no other option than to fall back on YouTube videos.

Around the world, efforts are being made to make sure that the flow of information through the Internet is not disrupted. Many Web users outside Iran have taken it upon themselves to support the Iranian protest movement. Users are continuing—albeit in more discrete ways than at the beginning—to pass on the addresses of so-called proxy servers that give Iranians the opportunity to circumvent the regime's censorship. Projects intended to provide additional access for Iranian Internet users or to increase their security are springing up at a great rate.

One blogger who has collected a list of tips for promoting free speech in Iran explains the motivation of the global community of supporters: "Whether we agree or disagree with any given Iranian citizen, they ought to have the right to express their views."

Provided by Spiegel Online—Read the latest from Europe's largest newsmagazine

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