You can still use Telegram and WhatsApp via a VPN \u2014 standard or with obfuscation, which masks traffic to look unencrypted \u2014 or using the built-in anti-censorship tools already in the apps. But circumventing blocks and Roskomnadzor\u2019s countermeasures is an arms race. Keeping ahead of the authorities is challenging for ordinary people, especially the elderly.<\/p>\n
There are many stories where people tried to set up VPNs remotely and teach relatives how to use them, only for them to surrender to Max\u2019s convenience, even though it functions far less reliably than \u201cenemy\u201d counterparts. <\/p>\n
\t\tnews \t\t\t\tKremlin-Backed Messaging App Max to Come Pre-Installed on Devices Starting Next Month Administrative pressure plays a big role. In Putin\u2019s Russia, public-sector workers \u2014 long treated like serfs \u2014 have no choice over what apps they use. Government agencies<\/a>, universities<\/a>, and schools<\/a> have been ordered to move their work chats to Max. The same demands go out to property management companies<\/a>, which are told to move building-wide chats into the state\u2019s surveillance messenger.<\/p>\n It may not be long until we see a final block on Telegram and WhatsApp, plus mandatory linking of the new Russian messenger to everything from the state services portal to bank and online store verification codes. This is already being discussed<\/a>.<\/p>\n If you want to know what that will look like, just look at China\u2019s national messenger WeChat, in place since 2011. More than 90% of the population uses it. It is fully integrated with all possible services and entirely under state control.<\/p>\n Privacy level? Zero. There is no end-to-end encryption; the company that \u201cowns\u201d it, Tencent, can read any messages, personal or group. The system automatically scans for keywords to delete opposition content.<\/p>\n Stories of memes (like comparing autocrat Xi Jinping to Winnie the Pooh) or messages suddenly disappearing from chats are routine in China. Accounts with frequent negative content or criticism of the Chinese Communist Party (which has its own cell inside Tencent) can be monitored and lead to punishment, including criminal charges. <\/p>\n For example, in 2017, Shandong resident Wang Jiangfeng received a one-year and ten-month prison sentence for calling Xi Jinping a \u201csteamed bun\u201d in a group chat. A Chinese court ruled it was defamation and \u201cdisrupting public order.\u201d In 2019, journalist Ding Lingjie and two human rights activists were sentenced to 20 months in prison for a video parodying Xi Jinping.<\/p>\n The Russian Max messenger is clearly just as open to the FSB as WeChat is to Chinese state security. Programmers on GitHub published the results of their study of Max, which concluded<\/a>: \u201cThis is not just a messenger \u2014 it\u2019s a damn center for total data collection!\u201d<\/p>\n It is easy to imagine the enthusiasm with which Russian security officers will prowl Max\u2019s group chats and private messages to cook up showcase criminal cases. Right now, people are already jailed for \u201cdiscrediting\u201d the army or spreading \u201cfakes\u201d via social media posts. But soon, the same charges could be applied to group messages in the \u201csovereign\u201d messenger.<\/p>\n Professional informers will be the only losers \u2014 their job will no longer be needed when users\u2019 own devices report them. Send a picture of Navalny or a link to an FBK investigation to a \u201cclosed\u201d group of 20 people, and you could be shipped off to serve time. One can only hope that most Russians, saddled with this digital snitch by the state\u2019s \u201cvoluntary-compulsory\u201d order, will have the sense not to incriminate themselves this way.<\/p>\n And to ensure that the multiethnic Russian people harbor no doubts about the benevolent intentions behind Makh, State Duma deputy Sergei Boyarsky decided that the pro-government bloggers and bots singing the app\u2019s praises weren\u2019t enough, and proposed checking its most vocal critics for \u201cforeign influence.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tnews \t\t\t\tRegions Calling: How Russians Are Adapting to WhatsApp and Telegram Throttling Is Russia becoming a digital gulag? There are two scenarios for how this could play out.<\/p>\n The most optimistic is that authorities fail to block Telegram and WhatsApp. After all, they already tried with Telegram in 2018, and everyone knows how that ended. People keep using them as their main messengers and, if pressured, hide Max on a burner phone with minimal sensitive data.<\/p>\n In either case, communication between those abroad and those who remained, as well as among people in Russia, will become much harder. It will not quite amount to a full communications Iron Curtain, since contact will still be possible with effort. But the majority \u2014 intimidated and easily drawn into conforming \u2014 will be entirely under propaganda\u2019s sway.<\/p>\n For the repressive Russian regime, cutting off war critics and critics of Putin from their families is, of course, a special pleasure.<\/p>\n Last but not least, communication between emigrant journalists and sources inside Russia \u2014 which has already grown far more difficult over the past three and a half years \u2014 will become impossible or nearly so. Russian society will sink even deeper into apathy and hopelessness.<\/p>\n Even loyal Russians are unlikely to be thrilled at the idea of being under constant FSB surveillance. In Perm, approval for a rally against internet censorship obtained by the political party Rassvet (Dawn) was revoked the same day \u2014 apparently because the authorities realized too many discontented people in the million-strong city might show up. No governor or mayor wants to be punished for that.<\/p>\n As for President Vladimir Putin, who professed lover in chief of all things sovereign, he could not care less about who or why is upset. All his Kremlin wants to do is extend its control.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe views expressed in opinion pieces do not necessarily reflect the position of The Moscow Times.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n A Message from The Moscow Times:<\/strong><\/p>\n Dear readers,<\/p>\n We are facing unprecedented challenges. 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