Russia has started to cut off the internet in cities

Russia has started to cut off the internet in cities until the end of the war

The federal authorities of the Russian Federation have started massive internet outage in a number of regions, explaining it as «protection of strategic objects». According to local sources, in Ulyanovsk has been without mobile internet for about a week and, according to the official version, will not be restored until the end of the so-called “special military operation”.

Large-scale failures and complete disconnection of mobile communications are also reported by users from St Petersburg, Sochi, Tula, Voronezh, Ryazan, Krasnodar, Saratov, Nizhny Novgorod and Ufa.

Official explanation

According to local administrations, The decision was made by the federal government. Formally, this is explained by the «need to prevent cyber threats» and «protection of strategic facilities and residential areas».

However, analysts believe that the real goal is control over the information space and the isolation of Russians from independent news sources amid military defeats and social tensions.

Context.

Earlier, Russia has already tested internal “sovereign internet” (Runet), which allows only government services and propaganda websites to operate in the event of a complete disconnection from the global network.

The current large-scale restrictions may become The first stage of implementing this scenario, This will effectively cut off millions of Russians from access to global resources.