I’ve written a few times about Russia’s attempts to clamp down on social media and, in particular, the popular messaging app Telegram.
The backstory here is pretty simple. At some point last year, Putin decided that having a messaging app in Russia which he couldn’t personally control was a problem. So last summer the government started pushing its own alternative app called MAX.
Not content to compete in the marketplace, Russia simply mandated that the app would come pre-installed on every phone sold in Russia and, on top of that, it started shutting down servers for rival apps.
Over the past year, Russian authorities have been blocking popular messaging apps and coercing citizens to migrate to MAX, a new state-endorsed messenger platform. The messages there are presumed to be fully accessible to the F.S.B., the state security agency that succeeded the Soviet K.G.B. A recent joke from a comedy show on Channel One, Russian television’s largest outlet, went like this:
“Why are you writing to me in a private chat: ‘Hey everyone!’”? “Well, that’s how it works on MAX!”
That such a joke aired on Channel One — a significant stake of which belongs to Yury Kovalchuk, who also has strong ties to MAX and who is a friend of President Vladimir Putin’s — speaks to the animosity the people of Russia have toward the new app.
Usually the Kremlin faces dissent only from the small, liberal, perpetually-opposed-to-Putin part of society. But the state’s latest policies — blocking the internet on people’s phones, social media and internet messaging apps and running pro-MAX programming around the clock on many other broadcasts on Channel One — are generating criticism among the core of people who favored the war against Ukraine.
Russians know why this is happening so many of them are still using Telegram which seems to provide some security from prying FSB eyes. Now Russia has taken its war against Telegram to the next level. Pavel Durov, the founder of the app, is being charged with facilitating terrorism.
Russia’s main security service said on Wednesday that it had charged the founder of Telegram, one of the most popular messaging apps in the country and around the world, with facilitating terrorism, escalating the Kremlin’s efforts to restrict all means of communication not under its direct control.
The security service, the F.S.B., said in a statement that it had issued an international warrant to arrest the Telegram founder, Pavel Durov, 41, who is Russian-born.
The service accused Telegram of failing to remove information “actively used by Ukrainian special services, terrorist organizations and extremist organizations to prepare and coordinate sabotage and terrorist acts, mass killings and cyber fraud activities” in Russia. The charges are just the latest in a broad campaign by governments across geopolitical and ideological divides to rein in Telegram, which was founded in 2013 by Mr. Durov. Although the app has been a lifeline to people in authoritarian countries like Russia who seek ways to communicate freely, it has also become a global center of criminal activity, disinformation and hateful content.
Telegram really is used by a lot of criminals and other unsavory characters, precisely because their messages can be kept securely. But I suspect all of Russia’s complaints about it would have vanished overnight if Durov had offered the FSB some kind of access to it.
Instead, what happened is that Telegram became the main source of news and communication for many Russians and that meant Putin couldn’t control the conversation happening there. Early on, when the war was supposed to be going his way, he seemed fine with that. But eventually it became a problem and, ironically, his decision to clamp down on Telegram has caused Putin’s popularity began to sink.
There are also signs of internal disagreement inside Russia. Just a few days ago a Kremlin spokesman said that there were plans to lift restrictions on the app. Yet, today Durov is a wanted man. What happened there?
Anastasia Kashevarova, an influential Russian military blogger, wrote in a post on Telegram that the situation surrounding the messaging app had “clearly illustrated the fragmentation and lack of coordination among competing factions.”
“Yesterday, they were talking about rapprochement with Mr. Durov, and today, they issued a warrant for his arrest,” Ms. Kashevarova wrote. “That is why public trust in statements from politicians and officials is eroding, and that is bad.”
Durov lives in Dubai full time so he’s not likely to be arrested or to turn himself in anytime soon. Maybe Mayor Mamdani will seek to arrest him if he visits New York? We’ll have to stay tuned to see how Russian war-time justice plays out.
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