Russia moved to fully block WhatsApp on Thursday, in what Meta says is an attempt to push more than 100 million Russian users onto a state‑controlled “surveillance app” — part of a broader Kremlin push to curb foreign messaging platforms. WhatsApp condemned the move on Twitter, saying Moscow’s effort to “isolate over 100 million users from private and secure communication is a backwards step and can only lead to less safety for people in Russia,” and added it is “doing everything we can to keep users connected.” Simultaneously, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s communications regulator, announced new restrictions on Telegram and said limits will remain until the app complies with local law, TASS reported. The twin actions are being read by digital‑rights advocates as a familiar playbook used by authoritarian states: block popular foreign services, promote a domestic alternative, and progressively fold citizens into a surveillance ecosystem. State super‑app “Max” Russia has been quietly building its replacement. Max, a government‑developed “super app” modeled on China’s WeChat, bundles messaging with government services but does not offer end‑to‑end encryption. Local outlets say the government has mandated Max be pre‑installed on all new devices sold in Russia and that public employees, teachers and students are required to use it — moves critics view as steering users toward a centrally controlled platform. Responses from platforms and advocates Telegram co‑founder Pavel Durov framed Russia’s pressure as an attempt to force citizens onto an app “built for surveillance and political censorship,” tweeting that Telegram “stands for freedom and privacy, no matter the pressure.” He pointed to Iran’s failed attempt years ago to replace Telegram with a state app — a ban that mostly failed in practice — as evidence such strategies can backfire. Shady El Damaty, co‑founder of human.mind and a digital‑rights advocate, told Decrypt the pattern is now familiar: “China, Iran, and now Russia. Same pattern every time — block the foreign platforms, spin up a domestic app, call it ‘sovereignty’ or ‘security.’” He warned that even decentralised tools still rely on chokepoints — app stores, hosted UIs and backend APIs — and argued that “real decentralisation and privacy isn’t a vibe, it’s the most critical infrastructure.” A look back and a warning Russia previously tried to block Telegram from 2018 to 2020 but lifted enforcement after users widely bypassed restrictions and the technical effort proved ineffective. That history underscores both the limits of censorship and the new measures governments can deploy to make surveillance the default. Kremlin stance and next steps Dmitry Peskov, President Putin’s press secretary, told TASS that WhatsApp could be restored “subject to compliance with Russian law and a willingness to engage in dialogue,” warning that an “uncompromising stance” by the company would keep the block in place. Neither the Kremlin nor Meta had immediate responses to Decrypt’s requests for comment. Why this matters to the crypto and decentralisation community For crypto and censorship‑resistance advocates, the Russian move is a reminder that control over communication infrastructure can be weaponised to limit speech and privacy. El Damaty put it plainly: “When a government controls how you communicate, they control what you say, who you say it to, and whether you say anything at all.” He urged that privacy be treated as baseline infrastructure — built without backdoors, vendor lock‑in or a centralized switch someone can flip. What happens next will test both the resilience of encrypted and decentralised tools and the ability of users to access them amid tightened state controls. For those building crypto‑native alternatives, the challenge is not only designing censorship‑resistant protocols but removing the practical chokepoints that allow states to steer populations into surveilled platforms. Read more AI-generated news on: undefined/news