The Curious Case of Kurdistan's Internet

In a recent op-ed titled “Kurdistan deserves an amicable divorce from Baghdad,” Masrour Barzani, son of the former president of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), made the case for the independence of Iraqi Kurdistan. This is not the first time members of the KRG and Iraqi Kurds have made the case for independence, but as the war against ISIS drags on, the West has become more receptive to the case for Kurdish independence. Since the turn of the millennium, the historically oppressed minority group has become a major player in Iraqi politics; however, relations between Erbil (the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan) and Baghdad remain contentious. One of the reasons for these relations is that the Iraqi government and the Kurdish government have different policy goals, something that is particularly apparent with regards to the internet.

The current internet policy in Iraq is somewhat complicated. Internet service providers (ISPs) provide citizens with internet service, but there are laws preventing private ownership of “fixed networks transmitting domestic data,” which essentially restricts private companies from owning networks within Iraq. Effectively, the ISPs either have to rent the traditionally weak networks of the Iraqi Telecommunications and Post Company, which use fixed networks such as the submarine cable at Al-Faw, buy transit from networks outside of Iraq, or maintain networks outside of Iraq. Additionally, the government “levies taxes on transmitting data” on non-government-owned networks, which means that the ISPs have to pay an additional fee if they choose to buy transit from another private company. These policies have driven prices as high as $399 monthly for one megabyte per second speeds.

Therefore, ISPs in Kurdistan are in a perfect position. Geographically, Kurdistan is close to Iran, Azerbaijan and Turkey, which gives providers in the region plenty of options for establishing international networks. ISPs in Kurdistan are able to provide internet throughout Kurdistan; these companies can then sell transit to ISPs in Iraq. As of 2014, companies based in Iraqi Kurdistan, namely Newroz Telecom and IQ Networks, supplied around 75% of networks to private ISPs in the rest of the country, while other companies obtain access to Jordanian networks, satellite networks, or connections to Turkey.

The Kurdish companies enjoy more success because the “Baghdad bureaucracy” hinders the Iraqi government’s ability to provide reliable internet. Private ISPs usually connect to Kurdistan through Mosul and Kirkuk; although this became more difficult when ISIS took control of Mosul. When it comes to supplying internet outside of Iraq, the government has a positive relationship with these companies; for example, IQ Networks obtained a $100 million dollar contract from the Iraqi government in 2015 to “carry international traffic through Iraq to link to Asia and Europe,” with the caveat that the government would own the network. On the other hand, the Iraqi government tends to fight the spread of IQ Networks and Newroz Telecom within Iraq. Doug Madory, a researcher at Dyn,