7 ms·

I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and interne

by nabogh 3y ago

I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. To make things weirder, the article claims that only mobile networks are affected. I wonder why that is. Is this just the decisions of a handful of telcos and it's being reported as a state-imposed restriction? Edit: also in my opinion, "blocking at the protocol level" is a bit misleading since they can't actually see the packet contents. Wireguard for example is just UDP packets. They have to infer from other patterns that the traffic is Wireguard and drop packets that meet those criteria.

inrussianow 3y ago
Im in Russia now posting this over on a wireguard vpn, using a landline ISP. So far no problems, havent tried on mobile.
- zikduruqe 3y ago
  Are you using port 51820 or a different port for your Wireguard endpoint? Just curious as I have read where others have used different ports to circumvent DPI.
  - inrussianow 3y ago
    Yes im using 51820, but good idea to change it. I actually have 2 setups. One is a home router within a wireguard server builtin, the second is my Tailscale mesh network using an exit node at home in USA.
    - zikduruqe 3y ago
      Ha. I run WireGuard and a Tailscale network also. I've read that some people have used port 853 to mimic encrypted DNS or other ports less than 1024 to circumvent some WireGuard limits. I've yet to run into that. Might want to check out https://yggdrasil-network.github.io https://yggdrasil-network.github.io for fun. I used to use it to connect to various networks.
- midasuni 3y ago
  Are you affected by the annual “internet cutoff” My office in Moscow has IPsec tunnels and is fine, but we also see no outages other than the occasional last mile loss on one of the circuits (not at the same time). Maybe that’s because it’s a business line.
- justsomehnguy 3y ago
  Try Mullvad. EDIT: :rolleyes: try using Mullvad, specifically WireGuard servers, specifically on mobile providers.
- bombcar 3y ago
  From my days of piercing the great firewall of china, as long as you’re somewhat technically adept AND have access outside somehow AND aren’t currently in the crosshairs it’ll work fine.
DarkNova6 3y ago
> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. Is it not obvious? Russia has long blocked many apps associated with the west, such as Facebook, Twitter etc. and promotes the use of russian-only webspace. Because the people are not stupid, many evaded this act of censorship with VPNs. It was a surprise VPN were permitted for such a long time as it is.
rjsw 3y ago
> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. Maybe Russia thinks that Ukraine is using the mobile phone network to control drones in Moscow.
- amq 3y ago
  How does blocking VPNs prevent this?
arlcode 3y ago
The war isn't going as they imagined it. 1.5 years into a "3-day operation" against a smaller poor country armed with hand me downs and some of the western peacetime production does not fit the narrative of 2nd best army in the world. It's embarassing for the government that we there are even talks about them running out of tanks. Locking down the internet supposedly helps against espionage and allows easier control of the news narrative. Authoritative regimes are always very concerned with that because the lack of open political discussion makes them seem very stable and united until the very last moment. Additionally, Putin has a deeply seated mistrust against technology and the internet and technology.
- ethbr0 3y ago
  The fact that this appears to be mobile-targeted suggests the intent -- restrict free information flow to the masses.
vbezhenar 3y ago
> My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. Your impression was absolutely wrong. Before war, Microsoft and other big western companies along with police hunted companies which tried to use pirate software. So it was not a good idea to use pirate software for company in Russia, at least if you're big enough to be noticed. Ordinary people were kind of ignored, AFAIK. Both Internet restrictions and surveillance also were present in Russia in the recent years. Officially to protect children, unofficially to suppress opposition as well.
- azangru 3y ago
  > Your impression was absolutely wrong. Before war, Microsoft and other big western companies along with police hunted companies which tried to use pirate software. So it was not a good idea to use pirate software for company in Russia, at least if you're big enough to be noticed. Ordinary people were kind of ignored, AFAIK Didn't they say somewhere that in response to the sanctions imposed early in the war they were going to go lenient on piracy? I wonder if that promise ever amounted to anything, or if it was just empty words.
  - vbezhenar 3y ago
    I'm not aware of any real steps about that. Probably empty words. There are enough software makers in Russia, so allowing piracy would just make their life harder. Like why would you want to buy КОМПАС-3D for some hefty price if you can pirate Autocad for free.
    - bjord 3y ago
      They were not empty words. Here are a couple examples: https://torrentfreak.com/rutracker-found-itself-unblocked-in-russia-so-immediately-blocked-itself-220323/ https://torrentfreak.com/rutracker-found-itself-unblocked-in... https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/08/09/russian-cinemas-screen-pirated-copies-of-barbie-a82102 https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/08/09/russian-cinemas-sc...
  - bombcar 3y ago
topspin 3y ago
> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. Nothing at all. It's a pointless exercise with which some cyber security apparatchik in Putin's regime hopes to earn kudos from his credulous betters. In fact it will likely be detrimental once the filter forces communication of legit traffic (...) to propagate without VPN, which you know will happen the minute someone gets inconvenienced. Russia. \o/
lifty 3y ago
This isn't about cracking down on piracy or anything of that sort. It's about slowly getting control of the media and information channels that Russian people have access to. The same playbook that China has been using since forever. Authorities have been encouraging popular Internet celebrities to start posting their content on local networks/apps, so in time Western media sources like Youtube and Twitter will be blocked. The government wants to get full control of the information channels so it can squash dissent easily.
- Aerbil313 3y ago
  I don't live in China. Yet I'd very much like my country having its own national software stack (OS, search engine, browser, social media apps). All is fine for you guys in the US, but you forget when our national interests conflict with yours or big tech corporations or when the privacy of our citizens is concerned, it happens to be a national security issue. I trust my own government to not spy on me unnecessarily, and even if I'm to be spied by someone, I'd prefer my own government who is far more likely to act in my best interests than the three letter agencies of US.
  - goda90 3y ago
    Why would you need a national software stack when there's open source solutions for everything?
    - Aerbil313 3y ago
      Tech nerds often don't realize how much the world of software is subject to the real world. You can be cut off access to any technology if your country is not willing to give its natural resources to another. No different from trade sanctions. Open source is a bunch of individuals helpless in the face of orders from Pentagon to close it all up. * You won't have the expertise to quickly build your own solutions when this happens you are cut off access to a certain technology. A browser is a beast to implement as we all know. * You can't trust that e.g. Chromium as audited by American "experts" is really not phoning home if it detects the IP is from e.g Turkish defense corporation A's RD center. * You need to have that software-skilled workforce anyway to ensure technological progress of your country.
hooby 3y ago
> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. People use VPNs to get western news and information through other channels than state-controlled Russian media. If Russia can block these other channels, then their own propaganda becomes the sole information citizens have access to.
- codedokode 3y ago
  I think mostly people use VPN not for news but to access Instagram.
- gwnywg 3y ago
  If I was denied access to information sources I trust I would not go and swallow state propaganda.. Having said this, almost all of my Russian colleagues already talk like Russian TV and all of them use VPN this way or another..
  - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
    > If I was denied access to information sources I trust I would not go and swallow state propaganda. It seems there is always a segment of the population that takes up nationalism/populism. You don't need a majority to enable authoritarianism, just enough to ease them into power, maintain the facade of support and help chill dissent.
- owl57 3y ago
  In a strange twist, I'm currently in Russia and use a VPN almost daily, but not for news — English-language news sites from HN to CNN simply aren't blocked, and to watch out for any new scary local stuff I find it most convenient to subscribe to Meduza in Telegram AND read a Russian news site such as lenta.ru "between the lines". Websites I need a VPN for most of the time are ones that just don't like users with Russian IPs, like my Western credit card company.
lexek 3y ago
>My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. They're still pretty lenient on piracy, which doesn't cancel out the government ever growing desire to control the news/media/social networks space
Waterluvian 3y ago
A dictator has made some ridiculously bad moves and now fears that his time may be wrapping up. The (arguably correct) move from his perspective is to control the information space as strongly as possible. Ideas and truth are his enemy right now.
rsynnott 3y ago
If you’re a dictator who just survived an abortive coup, then, yeah, you’re probably going to want to tighten control on what people can and can’t see. Putin is very weak right now, and likely feeling extremely insecure. For good reason; like, you would not want to be his life insurance provider right now. This sort of this is as likely to be emotional support censorship for Vlad’s benefit as anything else; hard to imagine it being very effective, certainly. Expect more and more ineffectual crackdowns on information as he deteriorates.
- bluGill 3y ago
  > you would not want to be his life insurance provider right now Why not? Sounds like the perfect scam, collect the $$$, funnel it to some offshore account. When Putin dies the chaos of succession ensures that nobody will be able to attempt to collect before I leave the country.
  - rsynnott 3y ago
    I mean, I'm not sure how it works in Russia, but in most countries the insurance industry is about the most heavily regulated part of the finance industry, particularly since the financial crisis; that would be difficult to pull off :) (Now curious whether "client became a dictator and is currently provoking people into murdering him" is sufficient basis for an insurer to get out of a policy...)
    - bluGill 3y ago
      It is a reasonable bet that you can leave the country between his death and when regulations manage to enforce things.
codedokode 3y ago
> what Russia has to gain from this People won't be able to read anything contradicting government's point of view. It is important for stability in society that there is only correct and truthful information and no falseful foreign propaganda seeding distruct in government (e.g. by falsefully claiming that high-ranked officials own expensive villas in Europe that they cannot afford with their salary). > only mobile networks are affected. I wonder why that is. Because it is only testing stage now. > Is this just the decisions of a handful of telcos Why would telecoms spend money on censorship by themselves? It doesn't increase their profit. > Wireguard for example is just UDP packets. WireGuard packets are not obfuscated and can be easily detected. And even if it was obfuscated, everything that doesn't look like HTTPS can be blocked without causing much troubles.
dist-epoch 3y ago
> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. You misspelled Putin.
ocal5 3y ago
> To make things weirder, the article claims that only mobile networks are affected. I wonder why that is. This is easier, maybe, to follow where is going a wire than a wave.
gspetr 3y ago
“Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.” -- Pravin Lal Also, it's not just mobile operators. Major ISPs (with millions of customers) have some sort of DPI, or at the very least enforce the state's blacklist (which includes such "nefarious" websites such as FB, Linkedin, Medium, etc)

by nabogh 3y ago

inrussianow 3y ago

Im in Russia now posting this over on a wireguard vpn, using a landline ISP. So far no problems, havent tried on mobile.

zikduruqe 3y ago
Are you using port 51820 or a different port for your Wireguard endpoint? Just curious as I have read where others have used different ports to circumvent DPI.
- inrussianow 3y ago
  Yes im using 51820, but good idea to change it. I actually have 2 setups. One is a home router within a wireguard server builtin, the second is my Tailscale mesh network using an exit node at home in USA.
  - zikduruqe 3y ago
    Ha. I run WireGuard and a Tailscale network also. I've read that some people have used port 853 to mimic encrypted DNS or other ports less than 1024 to circumvent some WireGuard limits. I've yet to run into that. Might want to check out https://yggdrasil-network.github.io https://yggdrasil-network.github.io for fun. I used to use it to connect to various networks.
midasuni 3y ago
Are you affected by the annual “internet cutoff” My office in Moscow has IPsec tunnels and is fine, but we also see no outages other than the occasional last mile loss on one of the circuits (not at the same time). Maybe that’s because it’s a business line.
justsomehnguy 3y ago
Try Mullvad. EDIT: :rolleyes: try using Mullvad, specifically WireGuard servers, specifically on mobile providers.
bombcar 3y ago
From my days of piercing the great firewall of china, as long as you’re somewhat technically adept AND have access outside somehow AND aren’t currently in the crosshairs it’ll work fine.

DarkNova6 3y ago

> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. Is it not obvious? Russia has long blocked many apps associated with the west, such as Facebook, Twitter etc. and promotes the use of russian-only webspace. Because the people are not stupid, many evaded this act of censorship with VPNs. It was a surprise VPN were permitted for such a long time as it is.

rjsw 3y ago

> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. Maybe Russia thinks that Ukraine is using the mobile phone network to control drones in Moscow.

amq 3y ago
How does blocking VPNs prevent this?

arlcode 3y ago

The war isn't going as they imagined it. 1.5 years into a "3-day operation" against a smaller poor country armed with hand me downs and some of the western peacetime production does not fit the narrative of 2nd best army in the world. It's embarassing for the government that we there are even talks about them running out of tanks. Locking down the internet supposedly helps against espionage and allows easier control of the news narrative. Authoritative regimes are always very concerned with that because the lack of open political discussion makes them seem very stable and united until the very last moment. Additionally, Putin has a deeply seated mistrust against technology and the internet and technology.

ethbr0 3y ago
The fact that this appears to be mobile-targeted suggests the intent -- restrict free information flow to the masses.

vbezhenar 3y ago

> My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. Your impression was absolutely wrong. Before war, Microsoft and other big western companies along with police hunted companies which tried to use pirate software. So it was not a good idea to use pirate software for company in Russia, at least if you're big enough to be noticed. Ordinary people were kind of ignored, AFAIK. Both Internet restrictions and surveillance also were present in Russia in the recent years. Officially to protect children, unofficially to suppress opposition as well.

azangru 3y ago
> Your impression was absolutely wrong. Before war, Microsoft and other big western companies along with police hunted companies which tried to use pirate software. So it was not a good idea to use pirate software for company in Russia, at least if you're big enough to be noticed. Ordinary people were kind of ignored, AFAIK Didn't they say somewhere that in response to the sanctions imposed early in the war they were going to go lenient on piracy? I wonder if that promise ever amounted to anything, or if it was just empty words.
- vbezhenar 3y ago
  I'm not aware of any real steps about that. Probably empty words. There are enough software makers in Russia, so allowing piracy would just make their life harder. Like why would you want to buy КОМПАС-3D for some hefty price if you can pirate Autocad for free.
  - bjord 3y ago
    They were not empty words. Here are a couple examples: https://torrentfreak.com/rutracker-found-itself-unblocked-in-russia-so-immediately-blocked-itself-220323/ https://torrentfreak.com/rutracker-found-itself-unblocked-in... https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/08/09/russian-cinemas-screen-pirated-copies-of-barbie-a82102 https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/08/09/russian-cinemas-sc...
- bombcar 3y ago

topspin 3y ago

> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. Nothing at all. It's a pointless exercise with which some cyber security apparatchik in Putin's regime hopes to earn kudos from his credulous betters. In fact it will likely be detrimental once the filter forces communication of legit traffic (...) to propagate without VPN, which you know will happen the minute someone gets inconvenienced. Russia. \o/

lifty 3y ago

This isn't about cracking down on piracy or anything of that sort. It's about slowly getting control of the media and information channels that Russian people have access to. The same playbook that China has been using since forever. Authorities have been encouraging popular Internet celebrities to start posting their content on local networks/apps, so in time Western media sources like Youtube and Twitter will be blocked. The government wants to get full control of the information channels so it can squash dissent easily.

Aerbil313 3y ago
I don't live in China. Yet I'd very much like my country having its own national software stack (OS, search engine, browser, social media apps). All is fine for you guys in the US, but you forget when our national interests conflict with yours or big tech corporations or when the privacy of our citizens is concerned, it happens to be a national security issue. I trust my own government to not spy on me unnecessarily, and even if I'm to be spied by someone, I'd prefer my own government who is far more likely to act in my best interests than the three letter agencies of US.
- goda90 3y ago
  Why would you need a national software stack when there's open source solutions for everything?
  - Aerbil313 3y ago
    Tech nerds often don't realize how much the world of software is subject to the real world. You can be cut off access to any technology if your country is not willing to give its natural resources to another. No different from trade sanctions. Open source is a bunch of individuals helpless in the face of orders from Pentagon to close it all up. * You won't have the expertise to quickly build your own solutions when this happens you are cut off access to a certain technology. A browser is a beast to implement as we all know. * You can't trust that e.g. Chromium as audited by American "experts" is really not phoning home if it detects the IP is from e.g Turkish defense corporation A's RD center. * You need to have that software-skilled workforce anyway to ensure technological progress of your country.

hooby 3y ago

> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. People use VPNs to get western news and information through other channels than state-controlled Russian media. If Russia can block these other channels, then their own propaganda becomes the sole information citizens have access to.

codedokode 3y ago
I think mostly people use VPN not for news but to access Instagram.
gwnywg 3y ago
If I was denied access to information sources I trust I would not go and swallow state propaganda.. Having said this, almost all of my Russian colleagues already talk like Russian TV and all of them use VPN this way or another..
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
  > If I was denied access to information sources I trust I would not go and swallow state propaganda. It seems there is always a segment of the population that takes up nationalism/populism. You don't need a majority to enable authoritarianism, just enough to ease them into power, maintain the facade of support and help chill dissent.
owl57 3y ago
In a strange twist, I'm currently in Russia and use a VPN almost daily, but not for news — English-language news sites from HN to CNN simply aren't blocked, and to watch out for any new scary local stuff I find it most convenient to subscribe to Meduza in Telegram AND read a Russian news site such as lenta.ru "between the lines". Websites I need a VPN for most of the time are ones that just don't like users with Russian IPs, like my Western credit card company.

lexek 3y ago

>My impression was previously that Russia was somewhat of a wild west when it came to piracy and internet restrictions. They're still pretty lenient on piracy, which doesn't cancel out the government ever growing desire to control the news/media/social networks space

Waterluvian 3y ago

A dictator has made some ridiculously bad moves and now fears that his time may be wrapping up. The (arguably correct) move from his perspective is to control the information space as strongly as possible. Ideas and truth are his enemy right now.

rsynnott 3y ago

If you’re a dictator who just survived an abortive coup, then, yeah, you’re probably going to want to tighten control on what people can and can’t see. Putin is very weak right now, and likely feeling extremely insecure. For good reason; like, you would not want to be his life insurance provider right now. This sort of this is as likely to be emotional support censorship for Vlad’s benefit as anything else; hard to imagine it being very effective, certainly. Expect more and more ineffectual crackdowns on information as he deteriorates.

bluGill 3y ago
> you would not want to be his life insurance provider right now Why not? Sounds like the perfect scam, collect the $$$, funnel it to some offshore account. When Putin dies the chaos of succession ensures that nobody will be able to attempt to collect before I leave the country.
- rsynnott 3y ago
  I mean, I'm not sure how it works in Russia, but in most countries the insurance industry is about the most heavily regulated part of the finance industry, particularly since the financial crisis; that would be difficult to pull off :) (Now curious whether "client became a dictator and is currently provoking people into murdering him" is sufficient basis for an insurer to get out of a policy...)
  - bluGill 3y ago
    It is a reasonable bet that you can leave the country between his death and when regulations manage to enforce things.

codedokode 3y ago

> what Russia has to gain from this People won't be able to read anything contradicting government's point of view. It is important for stability in society that there is only correct and truthful information and no falseful foreign propaganda seeding distruct in government (e.g. by falsefully claiming that high-ranked officials own expensive villas in Europe that they cannot afford with their salary). > only mobile networks are affected. I wonder why that is. Because it is only testing stage now. > Is this just the decisions of a handful of telcos Why would telecoms spend money on censorship by themselves? It doesn't increase their profit. > Wireguard for example is just UDP packets. WireGuard packets are not obfuscated and can be easily detected. And even if it was obfuscated, everything that doesn't look like HTTPS can be blocked without causing much troubles.

dist-epoch 3y ago

> I'm a little confused what Russia has to gain from this. You misspelled Putin.

ocal5 3y ago

> To make things weirder, the article claims that only mobile networks are affected. I wonder why that is. This is easier, maybe, to follow where is going a wire than a wave.

gspetr 3y ago

“Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.” -- Pravin Lal Also, it's not just mobile operators. Major ISPs (with millions of customers) have some sort of DPI, or at the very least enforce the state's blacklist (which includes such "nefarious" websites such as FB, Linkedin, Medium, etc)