Official Moscow says it is ready to isolate itself from the global internet. But experts say that is not easy.
Between June and July last year, Russia cut itself off from the global internet network in a series of radical experiments aimed at testing if the country has what it takes to survive going “offline.” It was an attempt to prepare officials for an event when Russia might be blocked from using the world wide web.
As things stand, Moscow might just be preparing to put that idea to the real test, which could potentially unplug an estimated 100 million Russian internet users from the rest of the world.
Amid the conflict with Ukraine that has invited harsh western sanctions, Russia is believed to be actively considering ways to isolate itself from the global network as it tries to protect sensitive military data and social media information of its people.
One of the largest talking points from a document issued by Russia's Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media is the directive to all state-owned websites and online portals to transfer their domain name system (DNS) to servers physically located in Russia.
This will practically allow Russia to operate a parallel internet outside the global DNS run by the US-based non-profit organization Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
Russia’s confidence to isolate itself from the global Internet network is based on the concept known as “Sovereign Runet,” adopted by Moscow as legislation in late 2019 as the “Sovereign Internet” law. The law has been described as Russia’s answer to the “aggressive nature” of the US’s cybersecurity strategy.
Russia has reportedly used various measures to slow down and block Twitter and Facebook, which it claims "violate the rights of Russian citizens.”
Many experts, however, are sceptic over the efficacy of Russia’s potential move, saying that is not easy. According to them, technically, it is possible to disconnect all delimited transmission points, and that will be the end of it (and there will be no global internet in Russia,) but in terms of economic factors, a disconnection is far from simple. They notes that the entire Russian economy is tied to the global network and its disconnection will have a much more significant impact than the sanctions that are now being imposed and are already affecting the country’s economy.
“Russia’s decision to disconnect from the global Intendent will affect us one hundred percent as Tajikistan’s Internet segment is largely dependent on the Russian one. There may be problems with non-Russian web content and applications,” a specialist at one of Tajik IT companies told Asia-Plus in an interview.
“We will experience problems, for example, while the content and revising software of Meta, Google, Apple and other non-Russian companies. There may be glitches and slowdowns,” he added.
As far as Tajikistan is concerned, it is connected to the Trans-Asia-Europe (TAE) cable network via the territory of Russia and fiber-optic highway passing through Uzbekistan, and a second connection is from Kyrgyzstan.
