Russia’s WhatsApp crackdown: New restrictions blamed for access disruptions

WhatsApp has been facing major disruptions in its services in Russia as the company authorities accuse Russian authorities of imposing new restrictions on the widely-used messaging application.

According to a WhatsApp spokesperson, the country is trying to strip more than 100 million Russians from the right to private communication.

“In restricting access to WhatsApp, the Russian government aims to take away the right to private, end-to-end encrypted communication from over 100 million people, right before the holiday season in Russia,” spokesperson said.

As reported by Mikhail Klimarev, executive director of the Internet Protection Society, “As of December 23, WhatsApp has slowed by 70% since that day.”

In response, Russia’s communication regulator also threatened to impose a blanket ban on WhatsApp in the case of failure to comply with Russian law.

According to Roskomnadzor, the regulator, “WhatsApp continues to violate Russian law. The messenger is used to organise and carry out terrorist acts on the territory of the country, to recruit their perpetrators and to commit fraud and other crimes against our citizens.”

On Tuesday, thousands of Russians filed complaints related to service slowdown and outages.

Russia started rolling out some restrictions on Meta-owned WhatsApp and Telegram in August. The regulator has accused foreign-owned platforms and applications of not sharing information related to fraud cases with law enforcement.

Besides WhatsApp, other social platforms, including Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and YouTube are facing restrictions in Russia.

Regulators are also pushing to introduce a state-backed messaging app called Max to counter these apps.