[Beverly Hills, California] – [September 12, 2023] – The Institute for Voices of Liberty ("iVOL") and Code Siren, LLC ("Code Siren") today announced a joint initiative to provide free, secure collaboration software to the freedom-seeking people of Iran. The service will be available to them to communicate securely, regardless of political or religious beliefs. The service will be provided through a secure messaging app to resist surveillance and censorship.
In 2023, Reporters Without Borders ranked Iran 177th out of 180 countries in its World Press Freedom Index. The organization cited the government's "heavy-handed crackdown on the protests triggered by the young student Mahsa Amini's death in police custody drove the country's social context and judicial environment scores even lower."
iVOL and Code Siren will provide free licenses to the freedom-seeking people of Iran to use Polynom™, a post-quantum cryptographic collaboration suite of communications software that provides users with a quantum-proof, scalable end-to-end encryption platform. Through its sophisticated security features, Polynom enables public users to collaborate anonymously, without surveillance, and out of reach of authoritarian governments that are determined to violate the users' most fundamental rights.
"With this generous offer from Code Siren, iVOL is helping the freedom-seeking Iranian people be better equipped to counter the Islamic Republic's efforts to surveil and censor them. Ordinary freedom-seeking Iranians will be able to freely express themselves and resist the repressive internet censorship and surveillance tools deployed by the Iranian regime," said Honorable Bijan R. Kian, Co-Founder and President of iVOL.
"We are proud to partner with iVOL to provide free and secure communications to the freedom-seeking people of Iran," said Eric Anderson, CEO of Code Siren. "This initiative is a critical step in advancing internet freedom and the free flow of information in Iran."
"We believe every human being deserves the right to free and open communication free of repressive internet censorship," said Mr. Anderson. "Along with the use of a VPN, Polynom will help to ensure that the freedom-seeking people of Iran can freely express themselves and share information without fear of censorship or reprisal," said Mr. Kian.
The initiative is authorized by the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Asset Control under the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations (ITSR) General License D-2, which allows for exporting or re- exporting certain services and software to Iran. This license authorizes certain services to the people of Iran, including providing collaboration software.
"We are grateful to the U.S. government for issuing this license," said Eric Anderson. "It allows us to provide this important service to the freedom-seeking people of Iran."
For more information, please visit https://ivol.institute/ and https://polynom.app/
To run Polynom mobile, you will need an Android device with Android 9 or above. To run Polynom's desktop client, you need Windows 10 or later. iOS and other client platforms are coming soon. In addition to Polynom.app, Polynom can be downloaded from the Microsoft Windows Store and the Google Play Store.
The Institute for Voices of Liberty is a nonprofit, educational public policy institute dedicated to reflecting the aspirations of the people of Iran in their quest for freedom, pluralism, human rights, and democracy.
Media Contact: Miss Azadeh Allen, Director of Office of the Secretariat
+1-307-369-8252
Founded in 2018, Code Siren is a deep tech cybersecurity-focused startup that builds sophisticated cryptographic tools that are easy to use and accessible to everyone.
Media Contact: press@codesiren.com
URL: https://polynom.app/
