Russian Internet providers have begun implementing workarounds to speed up YouTube. This appears to be an attempt by the government to slow down the video streaming platform, the business newspaper Kommersant reported on Wednesday, citing industry insiders.
This move came less than a month after online users in Russia noticed a sharp drop in YouTube loading speeds. These disruptions coincided with warnings from the Russian state-owned telecom giant that “technical issues” caused by the withdrawal of Google equipment from the country would lead to slowdowns.
At the same time, the Russian state media regulator Roskomnadzor called on Google CEO Sundar Pichai to restore over 200 YouTube channels of pro-government Russian media, authorities and other public figures.
However, since there is no official statement from Roskomnadzor regarding the slowdown of YouTube, telecom companies have started using tools to make the site more accessible to their customers.
A telecommunications industry source cited by Kommersant said dozens of Internet providers have already installed systems to circumvent the apparent throttling. Another insider reported that user traffic is being redirected from Google’s Russian servers to European ones.
“We do not see any violations of the rules,” said Oleg Grishchenko, president of the telecommunications association Rosteleset, which represents over 200 regional providers. “There are no official restrictions on YouTube.”
Yekaterina Abashina, a lawyer at the First Digital Bar Association in Moscow, told Kommersant that while telecom operators were responsible for blocking banned websites, they were not responsible for the “poor quality of traffic filtering” by Roskomnadzor’s systems.
However, Abashina warned that these workarounds could also expose providers to other legal risks. “Traffic manipulation could lead to violations of the articles of the Administrative Code regulating the operation of TSPU (technical means of countering threats), which could lead to the revocation of their licenses,” she told Kommersant.
Since the large-scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, Russian authorities have accused YouTube and Google of spreading “terrorist” anti-war content, fueling speculation about a possible complete blocking of the video streaming website.
