{"id":352,"date":"2025-08-11T22:06:18","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T19:06:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/?p=352"},"modified":"2025-08-14T22:08:35","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T19:08:35","slug":"browser-history-the-kremlins-newest-weapon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/red-web\/browser-history-the-kremlins-newest-weapon\/","title":{"rendered":"Browser History: The Kremlin\u2019s Newest Weapon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Andrei Soldatov, Irina Borogan<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Russian Duma has adopted a bill<\/a> that effectively introduces punishment for internet searches deemed extremist by the Kremlin. This label is primarily applied to content produced by opposition groups in exile and independent media, and therefore seeks to punish its readers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill introduces fines ranging from 3,000 to 5,000 rubles (approximately $38-$64). However, it is widely understood that the most serious punishment is not the fine itself, but the risk of being blacklisted by Russian authorities \u2013 a designation that opens the door to a wide range of consequences in Vladimir Putin\u2019s increasingly repressive despotism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The direction of travel is clear. The new legislation follows a sustained attack on WhatsApp, which is hugely popular and is now the last major Western social media platform not yet banned. It is an app of choice for all kinds of groups \u2013 from parents\u2019 class chats to tenants of apartment buildings. In July, Russian MPs began talking about the need to outlaw and ban the app. Anton Gorelkin, deputy head of the Duma Committee on Information Policy, said it is time for WhatsApp to \u201cprepare to leave the Russian market.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The crackdown coincides with the rollout of \u201cMax,\u201d a Kremlin-backed messaging app developed by VK (the Russian social media platform) and touted as a domestic alternative to WhatsApp. In July, the Russian government designated Max as a Russian \u201dnational messenger\u201d \u2014 a Russian adaptation of the Chinese approach to making state-approved social platforms the standard for communication with state-provided services, banks, and other service providers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The attack on WhatsApp and the new repressive legislation form part of the same Kremlin effort to harass Russians into switching to Max from WhatsApp. Indeed, six Russian regions \u2014 including Mari El, Tatarstan, Altai, Khanty-Mansiysk, and the Vladimir and Tver regions \u2014 are reportedly readying themselves to migrate school-related group chats to Max. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The policy is likely to work, especially if the population is given no choice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the larger consequences of the broader crackdown \u2014 including the introduction of fines for searching online for information critical of the Kremlin \u2014 could be far more significant. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a way, it is yet another ambitious attempt by the Kremlin to change Russian social behavior following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Kremlin\u2019s first exercise to alter the social behavior after February 2022 was to intimidate the population into abandoning the bad and dangerous habit of discussing politics in public spaces. Until 2022, it was very common to hear people expressing dissatisfaction with Putin at caf\u00e9 tables across Moscow, St Petersburg, and other big cities. That changed within a few months.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simultaneously, Kremlin propaganda promoted stories about Russians being denounced by fellow travelers to the authorities for watching or reading Ukrainian news on their phones on public transport. The population, already bombarded by constant threats, took this very seriously: these days, one rarely sees Russians watching videos with, say, Zelenskyy, on the Moscow metro. That attempt to change social behavior largely succeeded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what about the Kremlin\u2019s effort to change Russians\u2019 habit of searching for independent information? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Generations of Russians grew up on the free internet. When the Kremlin started monitoring and policing social media a decade ago, it aimed to suppress free speech, and it was less interested in what kind of information ordinary Russians could access on YouTube or Instagram.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Citizens could read and watch whatever they want on social media blocked by the Kremlin \u2014 VPN use has not been a crime, and millions watch videos made by popular bloggers in exile and read investigations about Kremlin corruption or war crimes in Ukraine \u2014 published by journalists placed on the authorities\u2019 wanted list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This habit of free access to information has been so strong that even Putin\u2019s favorite TV presenter, Ekaterina Andreeva, vocally stood up against the ban of her beloved Instagram, where she had often posted photos of luxury resorts and yachts, and admitted she still used it despite the ban. \u201cI continue posting on Instagram via VPN . . . I believe that banning Instagram in Russia for people who are not involved in extremist activities is wrong,\u201d she said<\/a> in May 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If even Putin\u2019s propagandists find it hard to change their online habits, re-educating others not to watch their favorite political shows on YouTube or listen to podcasts made by reporters labeled as extremists will be very difficult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unless the Kremlin starts arresting people and sending them to prison.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even then, repression might prove useless in times of major crisis; there is now a well-established and global urge to reach for social media to share emotions and footage. Russia is not immune.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is why we still see dozens of videos of Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian cities on VK (a Russian analog of Facebook) or Telegram \u2014 despite numerous warnings from the Russian military and the authorities against exactly that. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Human habits die hard. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Published first in CEPA <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Agentura.ru 2025<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Russia\u2019s rulers are taking more and more extreme measures to block access to independently produced information. The Russian Duma has\u00a0adopted a bill\u00a0that effectively introduces punishment for internet searches deemed extremist by the authorities. In reality, it is yet another ambitious attempt by the Kremlin to change Russian social behavior following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":353,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-red-web"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=352"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":355,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352\/revisions\/355"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentura.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}