Some Russians are breaking through Putin’s digital iron curtain – leading to quarrels with friends and family –

Pro-government propaganda feeds television, but facts about the war are still a matter of debate via Russian social media.

(Chelsea Charles for the Washington Post)

A few days after Russian tanks entered Ukraine, Mariam, a 37-year-old mother in western Russia, downloaded a virtual private network to prevent a blockage she saw falling on the country’s internet.

Instinct was right. As the Kremlin began to reverse years of relative internet freedom and curtail American social networks and Western news sites, the VPN became a lifesaver, allowing it to chat with a friend in the US and read updates on Facebook and Instagram. . current war news. Every 10-20 minutes. Maria considers the conflict a “tragedy” and says the problem leaves her with “anger, sadness and compassion”.

But Maria says she believes her mother. What he saw on Russian state television, where the Russian invasion was described as a real military campaign to liberate Ukraine from the Nazis. A different point of view sparked a bitter argument, and after the one that made her mother cry, Mary vowed to stop talking to her about the war.

Some Russians, often with social, educational or professional ties to the United States and Western Europe, are trying to break Russian President Vladimir Putin’s propaganda bubble, sometimes even by confronting their family, friends and colleagues. The war in Ukraine is exacerbating the already existing rift between young people, tech-savvy and older generations, who mostly get the news on television and have always felt more comfortable with Putin’s vision of the country.

Nearly 85% of the country’s population has World Bank data online. But only some of these people use American social networks. According to research firm eMarketer, around half of Russian internet users were on Instagram in 2022, while only a small fraction were on Facebook and Twitter.

Direct updates Russia-Ukraine

Many Russians accessing the internet have relied on digital tools to manipulate Russian censorship. They search the Internet for independent war news, sharing information with others from government propaganda that supports television, government sponsored websites, and most social networks that remain off-limits like Telegram or VK. live fans. government groups.

This ideological flaw is reflected in interviews with dozens of people in Russia, who speak on condition of anonymity in most cases in order not to violate the country’s fake news law.

Moscow journalist Mikhail Shevelev describes these words as “shock, hatred and depression”. Position. ᲡᲐᲢᲔᲚᲔᲕᲘᲖᲘᲝ.

“It is really difficult for anyone, even for Russians who do not live in Russia, to understand the extent of the utterly illogical perception of information and blatant lies,” he said.

Old Russians are the main viewers of Russian state television news, inundated with reports of fake US biomass laboratories and Ukrainian “Nazis”.

Inside the Russian propaganda bubble: where war is not war

At the same time, Putin is using increasingly advanced censorship technology. In addition to restrictions on Facebook and Twitter, Russia has blocked several major Western media websites, including the British BBC and German Deutsche Welle. In response to sanctions and public pressure, major technology companies including Apple, Microsoft and Amazon have suspended some sales and services in the country, further promoting what they call the “Iron Curtain.”

However, the Russians seem determined to circumvent the restrictions. According to digital intelligence firm Sensor Tower, the top five VPNs on the Apple App Store and Google Play were downloaded 6.4 million times between February 24 and March 13. The VPN apps themselves were downloaded three weeks before the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Only 253,000 times.

Independent Russian media that sent their reporters out of the country are still spreading information about what is happening in Ukraine, and according to the Russians there is still some controversy over community groups on VK, the most popular social media network in Ukraine. Russia. Washington Post. Some Russians also find independent news on Telegram and YouTube that have not yet blocked Russia.

Alexander, a technician from Moscow in the 1920s, said he knew people who were friends with each other on the Internet and wrote articles about how they could never face a particular person in a war because of their ideas. “My aunt has stopped talking to some of her longtime friends of hers,” she said.

Daria, 20, who lives in Moscow, said news of bots, which often suggest hiring government employees, spoiled the picture by commenting on VK and sending pro-government messages. “Sometimes it’s hard to tell a bot from a real government supporter.”

Some Russians who use VPNs take war posts and discussions very heavily and quit.

Lucy, 29, a designer from Russia’s North Caucasus region, said she stopped using Instagram due to angry comments about Russians. She has relatives in Ukraine who were forced to flee the Russian offensive and she said she was half Ukrainian. But the hot online environment forced him to avoid social media.

“Is this the end of Medusa?” Due to the sanctions, Russian journalists are looking for Western donors.

“At first I felt very sorry for them. “I may not be there, but because I’m a very sensitive person, I feel their pain,” she said. As the war progressed, he began receiving death threats online and no longer following his Ukrainian accounts. “It’s very hard to blame something you haven’t done personally,” Lucy said.

Other young Russians said these online attacks on Russians prompted some of them to take a more pro-war stance in front of the government. A Telegram channel was filled with memes and posts criticizing “Russian hostility” and writing that Western countries support Ukraine because of Russian hatred.

A pro-government Telegram group with over 110,000 members posted a video claiming that the volunteers had gone to Ukraine to help the invasion. “We don’t need the whole world to be with us, dear friends. “It is enough for all the Russian people to be with us,” reads the video.

Putin’s multi-year campaign to strengthen control over Russia’s information ecosystem, once opened, intensified in November 2019, when the country’s independent internet law went into effect. The law required Internet service providers in Russia to install state-issued black boxes that would allow the government to control web traffic, slowing or completely blocking the site from loading.

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Some people in Russia also resort to Tor, an open source system that allows anonymous communications to visit services. Twitter and Facebook have created software-based versions of their platforms. Artem Kozlyuk Roskomsvobada, president of the Russian Digital Rights Group, said he and another country are browsing a more sophisticated mix of VPNs and custom browser add-ons to get basic information about laptops and phones. His organization creates a guide that helps people navigate the various services.

“The information now goes through many proxy systems, many barriers before reaching the user,” he said.

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Despite the growing interest in the VPN, pressure from the Kremlin has made many fearful of sharing their political views online. And the two-layer information system continues to dominate Russian thinking.

“Most Russians, myself included, do not comment or share their views on social media in any way,” said Daria. “People who watch TV believe that civilians are not victims and that our government is only fighting the nationalists in Ukraine who are harassing the Russians. People who read and look at state-controlled sources are not exposed to images of devastated cities and fleeing Ukrainians ”.

Computer programmers are targeting the Russian propaganda wall

Ilya Yablokov, a professor of Russian Internet at the University of Sheffield, said he believes Russia’s censorship capabilities so far have enabled the government to be successful in scrutinizing the national narrative. But this may not always be the case

“This is power control, this is narrative control, this is population control,” he said. “The question is, how much time will they gain?”

Heather Kelly and Craig Timberg contributed to this report.

Source: Washington Post

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