Tallinn, Estonia (AP)-a spicy tune through a blogger who mockingly complaining his poor internet connection in the South Russian city of Rostov-on-Don has received more than half a million views on Instagram in two weeks.
“How do you say that you come from Rostov without saying a word? Show a bar of mobile service,” Pavel Osipyan raps while walking through the city, smartphone in his hand. “We have the internet until 12 o'clock, and recently there has been no connection at all. It is not necessary to be angry, just get used to it.”
The complaints of Osipyan-not able to pay electronically for groceries, or to use paper cards while driving not isolated to Rostov-on-Don, which borders Ukraine and, as a home of the Russian Southern Military District, is often aimed by drones.
In the past two months, the internet – shutdowns of mobile phones, of which civil servants say they need Ukrainian drones, affected dozens of Russian regions – those in the vicinity of the fighting to parts of Siberia and even the Far East. Some WiFi disturbances have also been reported.
Russians who were contacted by the Associated Press spoke about card payments that do not take place, taxi and rit-sharing apps that do not work properly, ATMs that sometimes fail.
Experts point to the unprecedented nature of the measures and warn of far -reaching consequences in a country where the Kremlin has already limited online freedom.
Such shutdowns in the name of safety legitimize them for the public and open the door for authorities who abuse the limitations, said Anastasiya Zhyrmont, policy manager for Eastern Europe and Central -Asia at the Access Now Digital Rights Group.
A signal for regional authorities
Experts say that the trend started in May, when Russia celebrated the 80th birthday of the defeat of the Nazi Germany in World War II and foreign dignitaries flowed to Moscow for a large military parade.
For days, the capital suffered serious disturbances from the connectivity of mobile phones with internet for days, and Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed that these were deliberate limitations due to regular Ukrainian drone attacks. Asked how long they last, he replied, “This will be done if necessary.”
Russia has previously limited the connectivity of smartphones, with isolated cases during protests, as well as in regions that limit Ukraine.
Shutdowns in the capital, however, sent a signal to the authorities in the vast country that is a useful tool, said lawyer Sarkis Darbinyan, founder of the Russian internet freedom group Roskomvoboda.
Ukraine's “Operation Spiderweb” at the beginning of June, in which drones launched from containers on trucks that attacked airports deep in Russia, officials made all the more happy to take action, Darbinyan said.
“They were really afraid that drones can appear now, such as a Jack-in-the-box, in all Russian regions,” he said AP.
In mid-July, intentional closures spread to most of the country, according to after Svyazi-Russian for “stay connected”-an activist group that follows internet availability.
On Tuesday, the Internet -Shutdowns group reported in 73 of more than 80 regions. In 41 of them there were also reports of broadband network loss, while limitations on broadband internet in six regions took place, while the connections of mobile phones were fine.
Some regional officials confirmed that the internet of mobile phones was limited for safety reasons. Nizhny Novgorod Gov. Gleb Nikitin said this month that the measure in the region east of Moscow will remain for “as long as the threat remains.”
Asked on Thursday if such massive closures were justified, Peskov said: “Everything that has to do with guaranteeing the safety of citizens, everything is justified and everything is a priority.”
Unpredictable disruptions
Russians from affected regions say that the malfunctions can take hours or days; Patterns are also difficult to distinguish, whereby service works in a part of a city but disappear elsewhere.
In Voronezh, near Ukraine and often the target of drones, a resident said she felt she was in “a cave” in early July without a mobile internet or wifi in her house. The woman, who spoke with AP on condition of anonymity due to security problems, said that she could only get online the next day at work.
Mobile internet in the southwestern city of Samara “goes out at the most unpredictable moments,” said Natalia, who also spoke provided that her last name would be remembered for safety reasons. Her WiFi at home was also recently delayed around 11 p.m. around 11 p.m., which stays that way for a few hours, she said.
Connectivity has recently been improved in the Siberian city Omsk, said Viktor Shkurenko, who owns shops and other companies. But the internet service of mobile phones was in his office for a whole week. Some of his smaller stores that were dependent on mobile networks suffered disturbances, but nothing critical, he said.
“I don't feel super strong discomfort,” said Grigori Khromov of Nizhny Novgorod, the fourth largest city in Russia where regular and widespread closure was reported. “I have an office job and I work at home or at the office and have internet or wifi.”
In rural areas, small towns and villages, where mobile internet is often the only way to come online, the situation was more difficult to gauge.
Pharmacies in such areas have made an effort, Russian media and the Independent Pharmacies Association confirmed to AP. Viktoria Presnyakova, head of the association, said in a statement that recipes should be registered in special software, but that will be impossible without an internet connection for weeks.
A user of social media in the Belgorod region adjacent to Ukraine complained on the social media page of GOV. Vyacheslav Gladkov who, without internet and a working alarm system, have to hit villagers on a rail to warn neighbors of an attack. The authorities promised to look at improving connectivity in the area.
Authorities elsewhere also announced steps to minimize disruptions by opening Wi-Fi spots. It is said that they are also planning to set up an agency to coordinate the closure, according to Izvestia, a newspaper with Kremlin-supported newspaper that quoted non-geidified government sources. Peskov said he was not aware of the plan.
Russia's efforts on internet control
Russian and Ukrainian drones use internet networks of mobile phones to work, so shutdowns are a way in which authorities try to combat the attacks, said Kateryna Stepanenko, a Russian analyst at the Washington Institute for the Study of War.
But it is also part of the long -term efforts of the Kremlin to curb the internet. In the past decade, authorities have actively censed online content, which blocks thousands of websites of independent media, opposition groups and human rights organizations.
After the full invasion of Russia in Ukraine in 2022, the government blocked great social media such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, and encrypted Messenger platform signal and a few other messages apps.
Access to YouTube – hugely popular in Russia – was disturbed last year in what experts deliberately called by the authorities. The Kremlin blamed the YouTube owner Google for the incorrect maintaining the hardware in Russia.
State Internet Waakhounds block routine virtual private network services that help bypass the limitations, and there are plans to introduce a National Messenger app, which is expected to replace foreign people.
Together with the Shutdowns, these are part of a larger campaign “to establish control over the internet, something that the Kremlin had not done 20 years earlier at the same level that China did,” said ISW's Stepanenko.
Access Now's Zhyrmont says it is “very worrying” that Russians have become used to life with growing internet restrictions, including shutdowns.
“This should not be a modern reality,” she said.
