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Signals to be verified, not evidence: press coverage varies between countries.
/Country
Iran
56/100
attention index
attention index
Attention higher than 92% of countries
#13 of 157 countries · methodology v0.6 · 11 Nov 2026
The country in the five views
- Attention56
- Adoption · single source13
- Regulation26
- Problems and attacks63
- Opportunities49
/Why this colour
how it is computedReported incidents46
4 incidents in the last 24 months · percentile among countries
AI exposure41
percentile among countries
Generative AI use in the population: 12.8% (2026-Q2) · Microsoft AI Diffusion Report
Missing safeguards83
100 minus the safeguards percentile among countries: higher means fewer safeguards
Regulatory quality: -1.53 (2025) · World Bank
Rule of law: -1.22 (2025) · World Bank
Voice and accountability: -1.63 (2025) · World Bank
The state and AI
how it is computedNot part of the attention index
Openness to AI
50
Exposure to threats
71
as a target 65 · as a cause 77
Closed and exposedMedia coverage: high (4,453 AI articles citing the country in the last 32 days)
Why this value
Exposure to threats = 50% × 64.7 (as a target) + 50% × 77.4 (as a cause) = 71.1
Reported cyber attacks against institutions and foreign disinformation
Social media monitoring, government disinformation, AI surveillance, spyware, internet shutdowns
What protects
Government access to personal data (V-Dem, expert scale)57
Rule of law (0-100 score)39
2025 · World Bank
Data protection law100
2026-11 · UNCTAD — Global Cyberlaw Tracker
Shown alongside, not subtracted from the exposure
What we cannot see
We count reported cyber attacks, not all those that happened; there is no worldwide measure of threats made with AI; for surveillance and spyware the sources stop at 2022-2024.
Examples
Examples, not a count
Incidents where the state uses AI
- Purportedly AI-Enabled Targeting System Was Reportedly Implicated in Deadly U.S. Strike on Iranian Primary School (in the incident list of this card)Feb 2026
- Pentagon uses Anthropic's Claude to plan and support Iran airstrikes (in the incident list of this card)2026
- Alleged AI-Enabled PRISONBREAK Influence Operation on X Reportedly Synchronizes Deepfake of Evin Prison Strike with Ongoing Attacks in Tehran (in the incident list of this card)Jun 2025
- Grok generates fake Iran missile attack headline (in the incident list of this card)2024
/What we cannot see
Incidents never reported by the press · reports of serious incidents sent to the authorities and not published · systems registered in the non-public part of the EU database.
/Incidents by period
in the country0
last 6 months
1
6-12 months ago
1
12-24 months ago
+ 2 with only the year
/Reported incidents
4 in 24 monthsFeb 2026
Purportedly AI-Enabled Targeting System Was Reportedly Implicated in Deadly U.S. Strike on Iranian Primary School (opens in a new tab)severity: serious · partly estimated from the text
place: Minabcountry inferred from the textaccording to AI Incident Databaseorigin: United States (Anthropic, Palantir)AI labs pages: Anthropic
Also reported by· 2 articles from 2 outlets
- Iranian school was on U.S. target list, may have been mistaken as military site (opens in a new tab) · washingtonpost.com · 11 Mar 2026
- AI got the blame for the Iran school bombing. The truth is far more worrying (opens in a new tab) · theguardian.com · 26 Mar 2026
2026
Pentagon uses Anthropic's Claude to plan and support Iran airstrikes (opens in a new tab)severity: serious · partly estimated from the textGenerative AI
the source gives only the yearaccording to AIAAIC Repositoryorigin: United States (Anthropic)AI labs pages: Anthropic
Also reported by· 4 articles from 4 outlets
Jun 2025
Alleged AI-Enabled PRISONBREAK Influence Operation on X Reportedly Synchronizes Deepfake of Evin Prison Strike with Ongoing Attacks in Tehran (opens in a new tab)severity: moderate · partly estimated from the textGenerative AI
country inferred from the textaccording to AI Incident Database
Also reported by· 1 article from 1 outlet
2024
Grok generates fake Iran missile attack headline (opens in a new tab)severity: moderate · partly estimated from the textGenerative AI
the source gives only the yearaccording to AIAAIC Repositoryorigin: United States (xAI)AI labs pages: xAI
Also reported by· 5 articles from 5 outlets
/Laws and safeguards
Regulatory quality-1.53
2025 · World Bank
Rule of law-1.22
2025 · World Bank
Voice and accountability-1.63
2025 · World Bank
AI-specific laws and authorities: coming with new sources.
/In the news
how it worksAI news mentioning the country · 7 Nov – 13 Nov
- Democrats demand answers on the US government's AI policy amid alleged Chinese spy plot targeting the CEO of Nvidia (opens in a new tab)aninews.in · India · 12 Nov 2026 · and 34 other outlets
- Asian stocks steady as AI, Mideast jitters recede (opens in a new tab)bendigoadvertiser.com.au · Australia · 9 Nov 2026 · and 17 other outlets
- Quantinuum and RIKEN Expand Partnership to Accelerate the Commercialization of Quantum-AI Hybrid Supercomputing in Japan (opens in a new tab)nugget.ca · Canada · 12 Nov 2026 · and 16 other outlets
- Global powers head to Asia with trade, AI, security in focus (opens in a new tab)freemalaysiatoday.com · Malaysia · 12 Nov 2026 · and 11 other outlets
- TCL CSOT to Explore the Future of Displays in the AI Era at DTC 2026 (opens in a new tab)prnewswire.com · United States · 8 Nov 2026 · and 11 other outlets
- Cisco Unveils Frontier AI Red Teaming and Agent Observability to Secure the Agentic Enterprise (opens in a new tab)prnewswire.com · United States · 10 Nov 2026 · and 10 other outlets
- Stavian Group Showcases Its Infrastructure Vision for the AI Era at the Inaugural Fortune SEA500 Summit 2026 (opens in a new tab)singaporestar.com · Singapore · 9 Nov 2026 · and 9 other outlets
- Armada and Johnson Controls Launch Galleon Forge Two in Dublin, Bringing Sovereign AI Infrastructure Production to Europe (opens in a new tab)finanznachrichten.de · Germany · 11 Nov 2026 · and 8 other outlets
- 'AI poses real risks to collective security': the French president outlines 3 key priorities (opens in a new tab)aninews.in · India · 10 Nov 2026 · and 6 other outlets
- AI freezer cyberattacks: Hackers are using cheap technology to melt supermarket stock (opens in a new tab)theage.com.au · Australia · 10 Nov 2026 · and 5 other outlets
AI articles mentioning the country in the last 30 days: 4,020 in total, at most 320 in one day (6 Nov 2026).
4,020 AI articles mentioning the country in 30 days
/Index trend
— country ··· worldIndex trend: 18 Oct 2026: country 56, world 36 · 19 Oct 2026: country 56, world 36 · 26 Oct 2026: country 56, world 36 · 2 Nov 2026: country 56, world 36 · 11 Nov 2026: country 56, world 36.
Previous years, reconstructed with today's data: 2023 60 · 2024 65 · 2025 67 why
/AI models released
12 months · outside the indexNo releases recorded by Epoch AI for organisations in this country.