As the UK, Australia, and other countries appear to be introducing ID requirements and banning anonymous access, Russia reveals it has the ability to block VPN access.
This is a stupid move, and is causing a lot of anger. Telegram has become effectively unusable to Russian users overnight.
And yet, Russians will still rather fire up a VPN to use Telegram than using the state-sponsored MAX. Moreover, one of the most vocal groups denouncing what Russia does to Telegram are soldiers in Ukraine, which the government usually relies on for support and which define Russian government legitimacy.
They’re releasing their own state controlled version called “Max” - so that’s intentional. Even if this - at least temporarily - damages their own internal communications (also military I heard).
Can russians use tor as a proxy?
Via bridges, yes
good they all should do that. that should solve all the problems they have with VPNs, since tor allows any tcp connection, right?
Tor is relatively slow and bridges are regularly blocked. It’s a high-effort, low-bandwith option, so most people still prefer more traditional VPNs.
Tor is fast enough for text-media communications. The innovations of mass internet video have spoiled us.
Can’t you just use VPNs with wonky protocol that will not be noticed?
Russia got extremely good at deep packet inspection and determining all sorts of protocols.
Most existing protocols are now blocked for connections outside the country
A lot of legitimate connections are affected. There is a whitelist of mostly useless services and Telegram users are being MAX-herded. There currently seems to be no VPN that works reliably, out of the box.
“Only VPN tunnels that are pre-approved by state authorities will continue to function,” Mazay Banzaev, the Founder of Russia-based Amnezia VPN, told TechRadar in an interview earlier this year."
What defense is there against this? How do you get around this if it’s implemented?
“Obfuscation”, tunneling vpn traffic through harmless-looking https or wss. I use wstunnel, but there are other options.
As before, keep on coming up with more sophisticated ways to trick the automatic detection.
The sanctions aren’t sufficient. They want to show to the world that they can have their own economy crumble by consequence of their own actions.
Yeah no, that’s not going to save you, just like when you said that four years ago. The sanctions aren’t even in effect right now, due to the oil crisis. You guys are just so clueless it’s insane
Please Putin harden your heart and make the internet Chinese. Destroy Terrorgram!
Every nation will get a “great firewall” at this rate
The Great Chinese Firewall isn’t nearly as oppressive.
