Internet throttled. Popular applications blocked. VPN connections targeted. What's been labelled Russia's "great crackdown" seems to have one clear wannabe winner — the state-controlled app MAX.
Echoing the Chinese WeChat, MAX is a messaging app that not only seeks to replace the now-restricted WhatsApp and Telegram, but also integrates government services. Since September, MAX must be pre-installed on every new smartphone and tablet sold in Russia.
Experts, however, have been warning of its "enormous surveillance potential" since its launch in March 2025. Fear of greater government control, alongside MAX's poor performance results, has pushed Russians towards VPN services to keep accessing better alternatives.
Nonetheless, the Kremlin seems to be on a mission to make its super-app essential for residents' digital life. According to Sarkis Darbinyan, a Russia-based expert at digital rights groups RKS Global and VPN Guild, the latest campaign to "reduce VPN use" in the country through new blocking, fees, and potential fines needs to be intended in this way.
"Instructions have come down from the Presidential Administration to push people into switching to MAX, by any means necessary — through persuasion and deception, scare tactics, and outright falsehoods. Now, authorities have decided to increase the pressure on Russians also through their wallets," Darbinyan told TechRadar.
Putin's administration appears to be playing the control card to guarantee MAX's success. But how did we get here?
Step 1: Changing the law
Authorities know that an aggressive, wide-scale promotional campaign wouldn't be enough to convince the masses to switch to MAX — a change in the legal landscape was then needed.
As reported by the BBC, in June last year, Putin signed a law that establishes MAX as a "national multifunctional messenger." This means that the super-app is designed to integrate with state services, including the Gosuslugi (State Services) website, banking, and education. A legal promise that MAX will indeed become an indispensable tool for people living in Russia.
Authorities also geared up their power to control what citizens can access on the internet. After the passing of Government Decree No. 1667 in late October 2025, Roskomnadzor can now block content directly, rather than relying on telecom operators and ISPs.
In February 2026, the Russian Parliament then passed a law granting the Federal Security Service (FSB) the power to order targeted communications shutdowns at will.
While using a Virtual Private Network (VPN) is not yet technically illegal, a few regulations are targeting these circumvention tools. A law introduced in 2024 criminalized the spread of information on how to bypass internet restrictions. A rule that led to Google getting fined 22.8 million rubles last February.
In July 2025, lawmakers passed a law penalizing the search for 'extremist' content, introducing fresh fines for those accessing illegal material via a VPN.
Step 2: Kill off the competition
Changing the legal landscape gave the Kremlin the pass to control the internet, but it was with new sophisticated blocking techniques that authorities have been killing off MAX's competition.
While the likes of Facebook and Instagram went dark back in March 2022, after Meta was deemed an "extremist organization," Russians could still access WhatsApp, YouTube, and Telegram — with the latter being the most widespread across the country.
Everything changed in the past few months. Restrictions started in August last year, with February 2026 marking a clear escalation with the deployment of a mix of DNS blocking and DPI techniques.
Russia is restricting access to Telegram to force its citizens onto a state-controlled app built for surveillance and political censorship. This authoritarian move won’t change our course. Telegram stands for freedom and privacy, no matter the pressure.February 10, 2026
The Kremlin says restrictions are needed for security reasons, but experts argue the move is directly related to promoting wider MAX usage.
"It was clear the process would continue slowly but steadily until these platforms were fully blocked. What we misjudged, however, was the timing of the crackdown on Telegram," Darbinyan told TechRadar back in February, while pointing out that the Telegram restrictions began the same day VK announced the launch of "private channels" on MAX.
Telegram's CEO, Pavel Durov, also deemed the move "authoritarian," describing it as a way "to force citizens onto a state-controlled app built for surveillance and political censorship."
Step 3: Make using a VPN harder
VPNs have long been a vital tool in Russia, as they enable residents to evade the strict government censorship and access international news outlets and other blocked platforms. This need is now even more crucial as the last line of communications has been cut off.
As experts talking to TechRadar at the beginning of the year explain, Russia’s battle against VPNs has entered a new, more violent phase. They indeed predict that the push towards MAX would have intensified VPN blocking.
These efforts have especially escalated this week as the Minister of Digital Development, Maksut Shadaev, refined its tactics to make using a VPN even harder.
First, Shadaev announced new blocking obligations for platforms and a potential supercharge for users who exceed 15GB of international data per month. This is while weighing the possibility of introducing administrative penalties against those using circumvention tools. Then, he ordered telecom operators to disable Apple ID payments to make paying for a VPN subscription harder.
All this happened as Apple removed several custom VPN clients from the Russian App Store at the request of the state’s media regulator, Roskomnadzor.
These measures, according to some commentators, may be the product of the technical limitations in successfully blocking VPN connections. VPN providers keep investing in capable censorship-resistant tools like AmneziaWG, QUIC, and other obfuscation protocols. That said, they are surely telling of the direction the government wants to go.
False step? The Telegram ban
Strict internet censorship and VPN throttling are nothing new in Russia. The Kremlin, however, seems to have underestimated the citizens' reaction to shutting down their favorite app — Telegram.
As reported by the New York Times, the Telegram shutdown has drawn unprecedented criticism from a rare coalition of the public, military officials, and even high-ranking politicians.
This, alongside the widespread internet blackout impacting people in Moscow, St Petersburg, and now those living in the Southern city of Rostov-on-Don, has been fueling a tick wave of discontent across the country.
The Kremlin went all in on MAX, and annoyed its strongest supporters in the process.
So, would this be enough to stop Putin from turning the internet, as Darbinyan from RKS Global fears, into "something available only to loyal and wealthy people who can afford foreign traffic and a reliable VPN app"?
