Apple Store Working in Iran

In the past week, Apple’s App Store has been unblocked by the US-based company to Iranian users inside the Islamic Republic.

The first report on social media was dated October 29 as the day the company removed the ban on Iranians accessing the store.

In recent years, Apple has successively blocked scores of services to people logging on from Iranian IP addresses. With this move, users can at least update their apps once again.

Financial Tribune contacted Apple regarding rumors by several local iPhone enthusiasts, but the company did not respond at the time of going to the press.

The familiar “Error 1009”, which Iranian Apple users faced when updating their apps is now no longer an issue, but still they face many obstacles when downloading new apps, especially paid-for ones.

As Iranians still have no access to the international payment mechanisms, they are still restricted in what they can do on the store, reverting to using smuggled iTunes Store vouchers using a VPN, or relying on mobile phone shop-owners to give them apps on share devices.

Several users have said they have not had issues for a while with the Apple store in Iran, but noted they first registered their phones with foreign-based ISPs.

One local company director based in Tehran, who is using a new iPhone purchased in the past week and asked not to be named, said his phone has had access to the store for a while.