VPNs Named as Tools in the Information War Against Russia

At a recent meeting of the Public Council under Roskomnadzor, data on information attacks targeting Russian Internet users was presented, according to D-Russia. The following key points were highlighted:

• The information war against Russia is being conducted in a comprehensive and professional manner, according to statements made at the meeting.
• “Its targets are public opinion, the Armed Forces, Russian culture, and national traditions. From the very first hours of the special military operation (SMO) in Ukraine, the scale of information attacks on our citizens through social networks, websites, and advertising and banner networks was unprecedented,” the publication states.
• “This, including the involvement of American IT companies in the information war, was carefully and deliberately planned,” it was claimed at the meeting. “Anti-Russian content and the volume of its distribution were funded with billions of rubles, and this is by no means a Western response to the SMO. Both the content and the plan for conducting the information war were prepared not as a retaliatory measure, but to provide information support for anti-Russian aggression.”

Roskomnadzor reported the removal of over 117,000 fake news items about the nature of the conflict, the actions, and losses of the Russian Armed Forces since the end of February this year. Additionally, according to representatives of the regulatory agency, “1,177 resources with Ukrainian nationalist propaganda were blocked—their total audience exceeded 202 million Internet users.”

“Special attention was given to the active Western promotion of VPN services as a planned campaign aimed at neutralizing the blocking of illegal content.”

The success of such promotion has been relative, the publication notes. Roskomnadzor managed to block more than 30 of the most popular VPN services in Russia, and this number continues to grow.

As an example of successful blocking, Roskomnadzor cited the cases of Facebook and Instagram, which were blocked in Russia, and their parent company Meta was designated as an extremist organization. By May, compared to February, the share of Facebook users among the country’s population had decreased threefold, according to authorities.

The number of DDoS attacks and attempts to hack IT systems has also increased.

Roskomnadzor reported that such attacks were repelled in cooperation with the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the FSB. Additional protective measures that Roskomnadzor now considers a priority include: protecting citizens and their personal information (with a special focus on protecting children), as well as safeguarding Russian IT services and information infrastructure.

Roskomnadzor believes that to overcome leaks and the illegal trade of Russian citizens’ personal data, it is necessary to combat demand for such data and introduce the strictest penalties for buying and selling stolen data, as this leads to many other crimes.

Special mention was made of so-called “counter-censorship efforts,” i.e., preventing Western propaganda aimed at Russian audiences in the media.

A corresponding bill was developed and passed in its first reading—here, the authorities see immediate revocation of licenses for publications that “participate in the information war on the enemy’s side” as an effective protective measure.

“This is a retaliatory measure,” it was stated at the meeting. “Western countries practice not just censorship against Russian media, but outright arbitrariness. As for global American IT companies, which essentially function as media outlets (the clearest example being YouTube) and, as mentioned, actively participate in the information war against Russia, there’s nothing more to say—they have never been bound by any rules, and now biased censorship of publications has become a regular practice, with no attempt to even appear objective.”