A massive technical failure has crippled Iran's major state banks for a second consecutive day, knocking internet and mobile banking offline. Opposition media reports that Basij paramilitary forces have deployed to a financial data center in Tehran.
A massive disruption has crippled Iran's state banking infrastructure for a second consecutive day, knocking major financial institutions offline and prompting an unusual security response in the capital.
According to the UK-based opposition network Iran International, eyewitnesses describe a "widespread disruption in administrative and banking systems" across various regions. The network, which maintains a fiercely critical stance toward the Iranian government, reported a significant security development in Tehran, noting that "Basij forces have deployed in a data center belonging to Bank Mellat on Azadi Street" and stationed their vehicles and equipment in the adjacent parking lot.
Domestic media channels, which typically reflect state-sanctioned narratives, corroborated the severe technical outages but omitted any mention of military deployments. The domestic breaking news channel Akhbar Fori confirmed that "in the second day of the widespread disruption in the services of Bank Melli and Sepah, the internet and non-in-person services of these two banks are still disconnected."
Impact and Ongoing Disruptions Limited Access: Both Akhbar Fori and the state-aligned Khorasan Online reported that currently "users can only use card-based services." Contested Recovery: While Bank Sepah announced the resolution of their systems, Iran International reported that multiple ATMs remain completely out of service.The conflicting narratives between state-aligned domestic media, which focuses strictly on a technical outage of internet banking systems, and opposition media, which highlights the deployment of Basij paramilitary forces to a bank data center, present a stark contrast in reporting. The domestic sources explicitly limit their reporting to consumer inconveniences, whereas the opposition framing suggests a severe cyber or security incident requiring military intervention.