Overview and Organisational Profile
Asam (asam.company) is a Tehran-based software and infrastructure provider specialising in high-availability digital platforms for news agencies, broadcasters, and major online media outlets inside Iran.
The company has been active since approximately 2013, based on its publicly presented operational timeline. Asam markets itself as the technical backbone for “leading media”, managing nearly the entire technological layer of client operations, from content-management systems (Asam CMS), CDN distribution, video streaming platforms, push-notification systems, cloud hosting, security monitoring, and 24/7 operational support.
According to their own statements, they absorb the full technical burden of large-scale media publishing, enabling editorial teams to focus exclusively on content.
Comprehensive Control of Media Infrastructure
Multiple Iranian news organisations, spanning economic, political, and national outlets, credit Aasaam directly on their site footers, with phrases such as “Hosted on Aasaam servers” or “Designed and implemented by Aasaam.”
This includes major digital properties such as Donya-ye-Eqtesad, Eghtesadnews, ILNA, Afkarnews, MojNews, NamehNews, and Parsnews. The company’s public client list includes over one hundred organizations, all of which operate under Iran’s national media registry system (سامانه جامع رسانههای کشور). Functionally, this centralises the digital infrastructure of a large portion of Iranian media within a single private entity, giving Asam operational responsibility for uptime, security, content delivery, user analytics, and technical resilience.
In the picture: logos represent Iranian state-controlled or IRGC-linked media outlets
Presence in State-Aligned and IRGC-Narrative Media
While Asam does not identify itself as a state-owned or state-affiliated enterprise, a significant portion of its clients consistently publish content aligned with the Iranian government and IRGC narratives.
Outlets such as Afkarnews and Parsnews are known for regularly promoting messaging favourable to Iran’s security establishment, including coverage of IRGC military achievements, regional proxy activity (especially in the cyber arena), and Israel-related geopolitical developments.
Donya-ye-Eqtesad:
o “Unveiling of two Israeli military products in cyber attacks”
Afkarnews:
o “Classified Israeli information leaked”
Asriran News:
o “Cyber attack on data from the Israeli regime’s Iron Beam system”
Asam as a Structural Enabler of Iran’s Information Operations
Asam company’s infrastructure serves many state-licensed, state-regulated, and state-aligned media outlets, many of which propagate strategic narratives highly aligned with IRGC objectives. As such, Asam acts as a structural enabler within Iran’s broader information and influence ecosystem.
Its platforms ensure the resilience, reach, and continuity of media channels that play a central role in broadcasting ideological, political, and cyber-operation messaging in direct support of Iranian state interests.
This positions Asam as a non-state but deeply embedded node in Iran’s hybrid media-cyber apparatus, providing operational backbone to outlets that shape public perception around Iranian cyber operations, and sustaining the information environment in which groups like Cyber Toufan, Handala, NetHunt3r, and the Cyber Isnaad Front gain legitimacy and psychological impact.
Media Amplification of Iran-Aligned Cyber Operations
Over the past two years, Iranian and regional reporting has frequently highlighted cyber operations linked by Western intelligence and cybersecurity vendors to Iranian interests. Outlets hosted or built by Aasaam have prominently covered and supported activities by groups, including:
Cyber Toufan (طوفان سایبری): Linked to destructive attacks targeting Israeli public and private sector entities.
Handala Hacking Team (گروه هکری هندلا): Known for targeting Israeli infrastructure and exfiltrating sensitive datasets.
NetHunt3r: A group claiming penetration of Israeli commercial and governmental services.
Cyber Isnaad Front (جبهه اسناد سایبری): A rapidly emerging threat actor assessed as Iranian-aligned, credited with breaches of Israeli defence-industry assets, such as the hack of “Maya” defence contractor.
Asam supported news organisations function as the information-distribution layer of Iranian cyber-influence operations as they routinely publish detailed accounts of cyberattacks against Israeli entities, often with technical summaries, leaked file descriptions, and commentary aligning with IRGC-themed narratives of “resistance” and asymmetric retaliation.
For example, a headline published by Asam supported Donya-ye-Eqtesad:
“The Maya defence company hacked; classified Israeli documents offered for sale by the Cyber Isnaad Front”
Parsnews by Asam Company
Parsnews (پارس نیوز) is a conservative, pro-regime Iranian news website that openly identifies its political and organisational structure.
On the same page and in every footer on the site, there is a permanent credit: “طراحی سایت خابری و آسام برکیزی آسام”, or in a free translation: “Design/construction of the news site by ASAM Software Group”.
On its official “About Us” page, the site states: “صاحب امتیاز: محسن پیرهادی”, meaning “License holder: Mohsen Pirhadi.” Pirhadi is a known conservative figure within Iran’s political landscape, connected to hardline factions and regularly involved in state-aligned media activity. His ownership positions Parsnews not as an independent outlet, but as a platform that operates within the ideological orbit of Iran’s ruling establishment.
This creates a simple and clear technical-commercial connection: a political news site controlled by a conservative politician sits on ASAM software/development infrastructure.
Who is Mohsen Pirhadi
Mohsen Pirhadi is a conservative Iranian politician with a long-standing role inside the country’s hardline political establishment. He previously served as a member of parliament, elected on the “Revolutionary Unity List” (لیست وحدت), a coalition representing Iran’s conservative, pro-regime “revolutionary” faction.
Before that, he was a member and later the secretary of Tehran’s City Council. As of updates published in 2024, Pirhadi holds a senior government position as Deputy Minister of Oil for Parliamentary Affairs, marking his integration into Iran’s upper bureaucratic and executive structures.
In addition to his political career, Pirhadi serves as the managing editor of the conservative daily newspaper Resalat (رسالت), one of Iran’s well-known ideological newspapers historically aligned with the Islamic-revolutionary camp. Resalat has consistently represented hardline viewpoints, framing Iranian domestic and regional policies through a pro-system, religious-nationalist lens. Pirhadi’s leadership in the paper reinforces his position within Iran’s ideological media ecosystem.
A review of Resalat’s opinion section shows numerous columns written by Pirhadi himself, where he explicitly praises Qassem Soleimani, depicting him as “more than a military commander” and as a central architect of Iran’s regional “Axis of Resistance” strategy. These writings adhere closely to IRGC and Quds Force narratives, positioning Soleimani as a visionary and moral figure whose strategic direction shaped Iran’s regional posture.
For four years, Pirhadi served as the Head of the Basij Organisation of the Tehran Municipality (ریاست سازمان بسیج شهرداری تهران). The Basij is a paramilitary volunteer force operating under the command structure of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
In 2019, the IRGC itself was designated by the United States as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), while its external operations wing, the Qods Force (IRGC–QF), has been listed since 2007 as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) entity.
He was directly involved in public propaganda campaigns, responsible for large-scale anti-American billboard operations across the city, describing the high production quality and coordinated messaging as indicative of the sophisticated IRGC/Basij propaganda apparatus.
Direct contact with Iranian figures who publicly express terror support
In the political-media space where Pirhadi operates, in the hard-line “revolutionary conservative” camp, some of the most visible figures around him are senior IRGC officers. One well-documented example is Mohammad-Hossein Saffar-Harandi, a long-time IRGC cadre who served as Iran’s Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance in Ahmadinejad’s first cabinet and then formally returned to the Guards as a cultural adviser to the IRGC commander, later becoming a member of the Expediency Council.
In 2023, in a speech reported by Iran International and echoed in other Iranian outlets, Saffar-Harandi explicitly described Hamas’s 7 October attack on Israel as “قابل تحسین” - “worthy of praise”, and added that “a handful of Basij fighters brought the world’s fourth-strongest army to the point that it was dizzy and didn’t know what to do.”
Hamas itself is designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation by the U.S. State Department and appears on multiple Western terrorist lists, including the USA and EU sanctions regimes. Pirhadi is plugged directly into this ecosystem: Resalat’s print and online editions carry Saffar-Harandi’s speeches and interviews under a masthead that names “مدیر مسئول: محسن پیرهادی” (“Managing Director: Mohsen Pirhadi”), and multiple conservative events covered by Iranian media, such as a conference on “revolutionary media” reported by ISNA and mass youth gatherings and cultural events reported by SNN and Borna, list both Saffar-Harandi and Mohsen Pirhadi among the main participants or guests on the same stage.
Summing Things Up
Taken together, these elements form a consistent profile of a senior figure from Iran’s “revolutionary forces,” a conservative newspaper manager, an ideological writer
promoting IRGC/Quds Force narratives, and at the same time, the registered license holder of Parsnews, A political news website controlled by a conservative politician operating on ASAM’s software and development infrastructure.
This situates Parsnews within the same ideological and political network, not merely as a neutral news site, but as a platform under the stewardship of a prominent hardline political actor.
It strengthens the argument that Parsnews operates within Iran’s state-aligned media ecosystem and reinforces government messaging through both political and ideological channels.