With reporters and the international press ordered away from protests in Iran, the use of social media by Iranians is gaining evermore imperative.

The grassroots activism of Iranian protesters who are denouncing election results is being enabled, in part, by Canadian researchers at Psiphon.

This is a censorship avoidance tool created by researchers at the University of Toronto. As the Globe and Mail reported:

At the heart of the disputed Iranian elections, a group of Canadians is helping Iranian activists gain access to what has become the most precious and tightly controlled commodity in Iran: information.

The Canadian researchers behind Psiphon, an online censorship avoidance tool, have begun a massive grassroots campaign to give Iranians access to sites that the Iranian government has gone to great lengths to ban – including Facebook, Iranian opposition sites and international news networks. Psiphon has been “pushing” that content to Iranians, giving them a glimpse of the outside world that has been largely blocked since the elections began.

Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube are playing a crucial role in broadcasting developments following the disputed presidential election results.

The allegations have been taken seriously enough by the Guardian Council to plan a recount. And seriously enough by Twitter itself to re-schedule an outage for maintenance.

Indeed, the so-called Twitter Revolution (though not the first to garner this moniker) is such an effective tool for change and the exchange of information, that the Iranian state appears desperate to maintain control, as reported NPR:

 Iran’s most powerful military force is warning online media of a crackdown over their coverage of the country’s election crisis.

The Revolutionary Guards, an elite body answering to the supreme leader, says Iranian Web sites and bloggers must remove any materials that “create tension” or face legal action.

Iranian reformist Web sites as well as blogs and Western Web sites like Facebook and Twitter have been vital conduits for Iranians to inform the world about protests over the declaration of election victory for hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Iranian authorities are seeking to exercise a stranglehold on press coverage of mass unrest after the disputed election results there, but they’re having trouble stopping a combination of old-fashioned, shoe-leather journalism and new social media platforms.

The need for journalists to verify sources and corroborate facts can help filter the massive quantities of information coming from Iran; there is also the need for an aggregate to collect and filter the torrents of information. The value of a journalist lies in the perspective, colour, analysis and interpretation he or she provides; an aggregate helps determine the credibility of a source. However, as evidence of a cyberwar escalate in Iran, determinining credibility can be extremely difficult.

And of course, this political uprising would not be the same without the use of the Internet. Consider the differences between these protests and the student-led unrest in Tiennamen 20 years ago.

Online communication is bringing people in Canadian cities like Vancouver and Toronto into the fray, which is building social bonds among users and also increasing the numbers at protests.

In Vancouver, approximately 200 people gathered on the steps of the downtown art gallery. The majority were families with adults, seniors and children, but several dozen demonstrators in their 20s and early 30s said they had heeded the call of social networks.