Moscow, Russia – Roskomnadzor, the Russian communications regulator, announced restrictions on Telegram’s operations within the country, citing violations of Russian law and a failure to meet user protection requirements.
In an official statement, the agency said, “Users’ personal data remains unprotected,
and there are no real and effective measures in place to combat fraud
or prevent the messaging application from being used for criminal and terrorist purposes.”
It added that these violations prompted it to take restrictive measures against the application.
This decision comes as Russian users have been reporting outages or disruptions to Telegram service for the second day in a row.
Reports also indicate difficulties sending messages and making calls.
The agency stated that it had imposed restrictions on the Telegram app in August of last year.
It later partially restricted calls within the app,
as part of what it described as efforts to protect citizens from scammers and criminals.
Deception, extortion, and sabotage operations
Roskomnadzor confirmed that the Russian government’s position on social media platforms remains unchanged.
It emphasized that Russia is “open to cooperation with domestic and foreign digital resources, provided they comply with national laws.”
The agency accused Telegram and WhatsApp of being used by fraud networks to carry out scams, extortion, and acts of sabotage.
It also stated that authorities have repeatedly asked the companies to take countermeasures, but these requests have been “ignored.”
The statement adds that the two platforms continue to refuse to provide Russian law enforcement agencies with requested information.
This refusal extends beyond large-scale fraud cases to include files related to the planning and execution of terrorist attacks.
The agency asserts that the platforms are already providing this data to foreign intelligence services.
Telegram has not yet issued any official comment regarding the recent measures or the accusations against it.
