{
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	"title": "Iranian agents blackmailed BBC reporter with ‘naked photo’ threats",
	"llm_title": "",
	"authors": "",
	"file_creation_date": "0001-01-01T00:00:00Z",
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	"plain_text": "Iranian agents blackmailed BBC reporter with ‘naked photo’\r\nthreats\r\nBy ELISE KNUTSEN\r\nPublished: 2017-11-18 · Archived: 2026-04-05 12:37:56 UTC\r\nLONDON: Iranian agents blackmailed a BBC Persian journalist by threatening to publish revealing photos of her\r\nas part of a wider campaign against the British media outlet, staff at the broadcaster told Arab News.\r\nNew details emerged on Saturday about alleged harassment of BBC Persian reporters’ family members and loved\r\nones at the hands of the Iranian security services.\r\nNegin Shiraghaei, a BBC Persian anchor, told The Times that her elderly father, who has stage-four cancer, had\r\nbeen interrogated by the security services. Rana Rahimpour, a presenter, also said that her parents were brought in\r\nfor questioning on multiple occasions by Iranian authorities.\r\nAnother BBC Persian presenter told Arab News she had been blackmailed by Iranian agents, who threatened to\r\nspread rumors about her sex life and compromising pictures. The tawdry tactics had also been used against men,\r\nthe reporter said, declining to be named due to security concerns. A fake news story about the sexual misconduct\r\nof another BBC Persian presenter had been widely disseminated by Iranian agents, she added.\r\n“If they want to make women silenced, they just threaten, (saying) ‘OK, we are publishing stories about your sex\r\nlife’,” the reporter said.\r\nThe reporter told Arab News that Iranian agents had raided her family’s home in Tehran, confiscating a number of\r\ncameras and laptops, and arresting a family member.\r\nThat’s when the menacing Facebook messages started.\r\n“I got many threatening messages on Facebook and social media from different people saying that (a family\r\nmember) was arrested and ‘we found many photos of you — if you don’t cooperate with the Iranian intelligence\r\nwe are going to (publish them),” she told Arab News.\r\nThe journalist said she did not know what, if any, intimate photos the Iranian intelligence services have of her, but\r\ndecried the ploy as “very dirty.”\r\nThe smear campaign was intended as leverage to pressure her into resigning from her job as a reporter with BBC\r\nPersian, she said. Failing that, she said, the intelligence services wanted her to provide them information about the\r\nBritish news organization.\r\nBlackmail is just part of a string of tactics the Iranian authorities have allegedly used to pressure BBC Persian\r\nemployees. Family members and friends of BBC Persian staffers, including the elderly and ill, have been arrested\r\nand interrogated, according to reports.\r\nhttp://www.arabnews.com/node/1195681/media\r\nPage 1 of 2\n\nAccording to an internal survey of 96 BBC Persian employees, 44 had been accused of sexual impropriety while\r\nthe vast majority, 86, reported being harassed. Almost half said their parents had been questioned by authorities in\r\nIran.\r\nIran has ratcheted up its campaign against BBC Persian reporters and their families since the contested 2009\r\npresidential election.\r\nWhile BBC Persian is technically banned in Iran, the broadcasts draw listeners eager to hear news updates that\r\nhave not been filtered through the regime’s official channels. According to the BBC, 13 million Iranians tune into\r\nthe marquee World Service broadcast despite the official injunction.\r\nLast month, the Iranian government initiated a criminal probe into many of the journalists working for BBC\r\nPersian in London, accusing them of conspiracy against the country’s national security. Over the summer, the\r\nIranian judiciary froze the assets of more than 150 BBC Persian staffers because of their work with the British\r\nbroadcaster.\r\nThe experiences of the BBC Persian staffers and their families — who have been subjected to violence, threats or\r\nindignities by the Iranian authorities — have been decried by the BBC.\r\nTony Hall, director general of the BBC, has called the campaign an “unprecedented collective punishment of\r\njournalists who are simply doing their jobs.”\r\nOfficials at the Iranian Embassy in London did not immediately respond to requests for comment.\r\nSource: http://www.arabnews.com/node/1195681/media\r\nhttp://www.arabnews.com/node/1195681/media\r\nPage 2 of 2",
	"extraction_quality": 1,
	"language": "EN",
	"sources": [
		"MISPGALAXY",
		"Malpedia",
		"ETDA"
	],
	"references": [
		"http://www.arabnews.com/node/1195681/media"
	],
	"report_names": [
		"media"
	],
	"threat_actors": [],
	"ts_created_at": 1775434380,
	"ts_updated_at": 1775791269,
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	"ts_modification_date": 0,
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