Russian Regulator Reportedly Blocks 36,000 Websites That Link To VPNs, As Usage Is Up 3,500 Percent

thegamer.com:

Russia's barbaric invasion of Ukraine has resulted in major sanctions being levied upon the country. Everyone from video game developers, publishers, manufacturers, and even content streaming services have suspended all sales and operations in Russia as part of the sanctions, as well as in solidarity with Ukraine.

The Russian government itself has blocked access to social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in an attempt to prevent its citizens from seeing how the world has reacted to the events, and also in order to curb pro-Ukraine communication. This means that piracy and VPNs remain the only way Russian citizens can gain access to social media and content streaming. All of this has resulted in a 3500 percent surge in the use of VPNs in the country, claims Lithuania based cybersecurity company, Surfshark.

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The company further claims that this has resulted in the Russian telecom authorities blocking over 36,000 VPN related sites in the past month. The last time Surfshark noted such a major spike in VPN sales was in May 2020, when China passed the Hong Kong Security Law. While the surge wasn't nearly as high as the one experienced in Russia, the number of VPN related sales went up by 700 percent.

While these sanctions have been put in place to oppose the Russian government's actions, Valve has decided to halt payments to some Ukrainian developers as well. Developers took to social media to share a letter from Valve, which stated, "Your banking information has been deactivated for the following reason: Due to the current environment, we are unable to send bank payments to Belarus, Russia and Ukraine."

It was later found that the