Technology & Science
Russia Begins Phased Throttling of Telegram to Push Users Toward State-Backed ‘MAX’ App
Starting 10 Feb 2026, regulator Roskomnadzor began deliberately slowing Telegram nationwide and a Moscow court levied new fines, marking the first formal step toward an outright block since the 2018 failure.
Focusing Facts
- Downdetector logged peaks of ~615,000 disruption reports on 10 Feb 2026, while Roskomnadzor confirmed “consistent restrictions.”
- Moscow Tagansky Court fined Telegram 10.8 million rubles ($140 k) on 11 Feb 2026 for refusing to delete banned content, with eight further hearings that could raise penalties to 64 million rubles.
- Russian troops and Belgorod governor said Telegram slowdowns hamper frontline coordination and civilian alerts, contradicting Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov’s public dismissal.
Context
States have long tried to choke channels they cannot read—from the Tsarist ban on the revolutionary press in 1905 to the USSR’s jamming of Voice of America (1949-1988) and China’s Great Firewall rollout from 2003. Russia’s 2026 throttling revives that lineage yet differs: it targets a home-grown platform central to both regime propaganda and battlefield command. The move crystallises two intertwined 21st-century trends: (1) the global fracture of the internet into sovereign “splinternets,” and (2) governments’ shift from blunt bans to ‘managed degradation’ that nudges users toward compliant domestic super-apps (here, VK’s MAX, legally pre-installed on every device). Whether this matters in a century hinges on technology’s cat-and-mouse cycle: encryption, satellites, and VPNs historically outpace censorship, but AI-driven Deep Packet Inspection could tilt the game. If Russia succeeds where its 2018 Telegram ban failed, it would signal that autocracies can now weaponise advanced traffic-analysis to re-nationalise the net; if it fails, it reenacts Iran’s 2016-present stalemate and underscores the resilience of distributed communication. Either outcome will inform how future states—from democracies fearing disinformation to dictatorships fearing dissent—engineer the next stage of digital sovereignty.
Perspectives
Western and independent media outlets
e.g., TechRadar, The Guardian, Intellinews — They depict Moscow’s throttling of Telegram as an authoritarian bid to tighten internet control and push citizens toward a surveilled state alternative, endangering free speech and privacy. Coverage stresses Kremlin repression while giving limited weight to official claims about fraud, terrorism or data-protection, mirroring these outlets’ broader critical stance toward Russian authorities.
Russian state-aligned media
e.g., RT, pro-government tech press — The slowdown is framed as a legally mandated step to enforce Russian regulations and protect citizens, with the government ‘regrettably’ compelled to act until Telegram complies and users migrate to the domestically backed MAX messenger. Reports closely echo official statements, omit frontline criticism and portray digital sovereignty as benign necessity, reflecting alignment with Kremlin messaging.
Pro-war Russian military bloggers and frontline soldiers
e.g., accounts quoted by PravdaReport, KyivPost — They argue that crippling Telegram threatens battlefield coordination, logistics and civilian alerts, effectively handicapping Russia’s own forces during the conflict. Criticism centers on operational harm rather than civil liberties, implicitly endorsing continued wartime use of Telegram while sidestepping broader censorship or rights issues.