Major Russian Internet outage attributed to telecom network issues

Russia’s internet regulator, Roskomnadzor, has declared that a recent widespread Internet outage in Russia was caused by issues on a telecommunications operator’s main network, according to The Record, a news site by cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.

The agency declined to name the operator or specify the cause, only saying that the incident has been resolved and restoration of services is underway. The outage mainly affected users in Moscow, who experienced interruptions to mobile, cable internet, and television services. Complaints were primarily directed at the country’s largest telecom operator, MTS, which has not commented on the cause of the incident. Major online services, including Google, Yandex, VKontakte, Rutube, and Discord, as well as banking platforms and telecom services, were temporarily inaccessible. Local Russian authorities are known to have orchestrated Internet disruptions in the past. Roskomnadzor conducted a test in December of a “sovereign internet” infrastructure that disconnected regions from the global network, and limited access to foreign and domestic platforms like Google, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Yandex services. Additionally, Russia has slowed YouTube loading speeds due to regulatory disputes with Google and blocked messaging apps such as Viber, Signal, and Discord for alleged legal violations.