Russian regulators have moved to restrict usage of the popular messaging apps WhatsApp and Telegram, the latest in a major step to push Russians onto a newly launched government-managed “super app.”
The move by Roskomnazdor, the agency charged with monitoring and controlling Russia’s Internet, is part of a larger, multiyear effort by authorities to control how Russians access information online.
In a statement dated August 13, Roskomnadzor announced that phone calls made using Telegram and WhatsApp would be partially restricted, asserting they are “the main voice services used to deceive and extort money and involve Russian citizens in sabotage and terrorist activities.”
“We inform you that in order to combat criminals, in accordance with the materials of law enforcement agencies, measures are being taken to partially restrict calls in these foreign messengers,” state news agencies quoted the agency as saying.
The move comes weeks after officials launched Max, a new app developed by VK, the social media company formerly known as VKontakte. Activists say Max is modeled partly on the Chinese app WeChat.
For years, authorities have struggled to come up with ways to control or monitor WhatsApp, which is owned by Facebook’s parent Meta, and Telegram, which was built by the Russian technology developer Pavel Durov.
Those efforts dovetailed with wider efforts to control how Russians use the Internet.
In addition to targeting Western Internet giants such as Facebook, Google, Apple, and Amazon, authorities have cultivated homegrown alternatives such as Yandex, VK, and Mail.ru and moved to assert oversight or outright control of them.
In a statement published on X — another platform regulators have tried to blunt — WhatsApp confirmed the restrictions and pledged it would do everything possible “to ensure that communication protected by end-to-end encryption remains available to people around the world, including in Russia.”
VK, whose CEO is the son of the influential Kremlin adviser Sergei Kiriyenko, has emerged as a leader in developing not only the Max app, but also an alternative to YouTube, the Google-owned video platform that is also hugely popular among Russians.
The creation of a super app would ultimately allow Russians to do a multitude of things: chat, bank, date, hail a taxi, pay taxes, download music, play games, order food, share photos. It would also enable regulators to monitor what Russians do online.
In June, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that all government services should be transferred to Max.
“They now want greater control over the information that Russians consume,” Mikhail Klimarev, an activist and director of the Internet Protection Society, told Current Time.
Roskomnadzor “cannot turn it off all at once, because it would have a big impact on the economy, it would be difficult for them to somehow explain this to citizens,” he said. “Society is already under great stress, and then this. Instant blocking cannot lead to anything good.”
