Russia denies preparing for rapid secession from internet

The Russian government has ordered sites and domains to switch to the .ru zone before March 11. Rumors that the country is preparing to secede from the global internet, the country rejects.

Sites and domains should switch to the .ru zone and to a dns server on Russian territory before March 11, if possible. In addition, they must remove JavaScript code from a non-Russian source. That is the purport of a message that appears to have come from the Russian Ministry of Communications and which was sent by Nexta has been published† Nexta is originally a Belarusian medium, which today operates from Poland. Techdirt, Nexta and other media speculate that Russia is taking steps to secede from the global internet.

The Ministry of Digital Development of the Russian Federation acknowledges to Interfax that the document was sent to government agencies, but denies rumors that it involves plans to disconnect Russia from the internet. “Russian websites are constantly being attacked by cyber-attacks from abroad. We are preparing for various scenarios to ensure the availability of Russian resources,” the ministry said.

In 2019, Russia conducted tests of shutting down the global internet. Against Fortune, Alena Epifanova, a Russian cyber-policy expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations, claims that despite those tests, Russia probably isn’t advanced enough to switch to a Russian DNS. Sarkis Darbinyan, co-founder of Roskomsvoboda, which fights against internet censorship, also does not believe that the announced measures will lead to a sovereign Russian internet, but are intended to protect Russian sites against attacks from outside.