Russia says “goodbye” to FaceTime: the excuse is terrorism, the pattern is total control
It seems that in the Kremlin manual for 2025 there is an entire chapter titled “How to make your country the least connected on the planet, but with Soviet 2.0 style.” This Thursday, the Russian authorities announced with all the solemnity in the world that they restricted FaceTime, the bitten apple’s video calling service. The reason? Nothing more and nothing less than alleging that the app is used to plan terrorist activities, recruit bad guys and even to scam the Russian granny. Of course, Apple, the owner of the circus, hasn’t said a word, probably too busy deciding on the name of the next iPhone.
The protagonist of this cyber control film is, of course, Roskomnadzor, the internet regulator that acts as an Orwellian older brother. Under the mandate of Vladímir Putin, this body has become the official DJ that decides what music (or information) can be played at the Russian party. His favorite playlist includes ultra-restrictive laws, platform blocks and surveillance technology that would make the writers of ‘Black Mirror’ envious.
From social networks to games: nothing is saved from the Russian blockade
The obsession with digital control is not new. Since the large-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian government began its digital purge: Twitter, Facebook and Instagram went into blocked limbo. Last year it was YouTube’s turn, with a deliberate slowdown that they passed off as a Google technical problem. Classic. And although the smartest try to get around the wall with VPNs, these tools are also routinely hunted and blocked. This summer, there were even massive mobile internet blackouts, a measure that was sold as “protection against drones” but that we all understood as another step in the manual of absolute control.
But they are not satisfied with the networks. The government has also gone after messaging apps. In 2024, they put the lock on Signal and Viber. This year, the ban reached calls from WhatsApp and Telegram, the two most used apps in the country. Roskomnadzor’s justification is always the same: they are used for criminal activities. Meanwhile, they are vigorously promoting a “national” app called MAX, which critics do not hesitate to describe as a mass surveillance tool disguised as a super app, and which, surprise, does not have end-to-end encryption and shares your data with the authorities if asked. Nothing like a spy in your pocket.
And in case anyone thought that video games were a refuge, this week they also blocked Roblox, a platform with almost eight million monthly users in Russia. The excuse: protecting children from illegal content and predators. A masterstroke to cut off another channel of informal communication.
The future is predictable: more blocks for those who do not fold
Stanislav Seleznev, a cybersecurity expert, explains it bluntly: Russian law considers any platform where people can send messages as an “organizer of the dissemination of information.” This creative label forces companies to open the doors wide to Roskomnadzor and the FSB (the security service), so that they can snoop into user accounts. Anyone who does not collaborate risks being blocked. Seleznev points out that this regulation is what has been applied to both Roblox and FaceTime, and estimates that possibly tens of millions of Russians had been using Apple’s service, especially after the WhatsApp and Telegram bans.
Their warning is clear and quite depressing: the FaceTime thing was “predictable,” and any other site or service that refuses to cooperate with the regulator’s demands “will be blocked, that’s obvious.” The Kremlin’s message could not be more transparent: in today’s digital Russia, you either play by my rules, or you don’t. Point.
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