What Russia’s War on Telegram Means for the West

The Russian government escalated its information crackdown by drastically slowing down the service of Telegram, a popular Russian messaging app used by more than 100 million Russians, including government officials and soldiers. This move is deeply ironic. In its pursuit of regime security, Moscow is jeopardizing other interests: military effectiveness in Ukraine, soft power, and human capital. The United States needs a strategy to exploit those gaps and keep information flowing in.

The throttling of Telegram is the continuation of a years-long Kremlin campaign to dominate the Russian information space and insulate it from outside influence. Moscow has seized ever-greater control over the country’s traditional and social media while expanding state surveillance and pursuing a “sovereign internet.” The crackdown intensified after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, with Moscow banning many foreign outlets and social media platforms.

In fact, this is not Moscow’s first attempt to crush Telegram, on which many Russians rely to read the news, including from opposition and Western outlets that are otherwise more difficult to access. Founded by libertarian-minded Russian entrepreneurs in 2013, Telegram soon moved its headquarters abroad and resisted government access to users’ messaging data, irking Russian authorities. In 2018, Russia’s communications regulator, Roskomnadzor, ordered a nationwide ban on the app.

The ban was a failure. With nearly 20 million IP addresses blocked, the ban knocked out Amazon Web Services and Google services across Russia. Additionally, users bypassed restrictions using VPNs and proxies. By the time the ban was officially lifted in 2020, Telegram’s Russian user base had doubled.

What’s different in this case is that Russia is not attempting to block Telegram outright. Instead, it is stifling the service while simultaneously mandating a state-controlled alternative, MAX.

Since September 2025, the government has required MAX pre-installation on all new devices sold in Russia. Beginning January 2026, all messaging services operating in Russia had to store user messages for three years and make them accessible to security agencies on request. State media market MAX as a “patriotic alternative to WhatsApp and Telegram,” modeled after China’s WeChat.

But this forced march to increase control over the Russian information space carries risks on three fronts Moscow will have to reckon with.

The most immediate danger is to Russia’s war effort in Ukraine. Russian soldiers commonly use Telegram for battlefield communications, while government officials share safety announcements via the app. Volunteer organizations rely partly on Telegram to crowdfund for gear for Russian troops.

The Telegram crackdown could compound the disruption to Russian military communications caused by the recent loss of access to the Starlink satellite internet service. Following the backlash from Russian war bloggers and troops, Russian Minister for Digital Development Maksut Shadaev promised that Moscow would not restrict Telegram in the warzone.

The second risk concerns Russian influence abroad. The popularity of Telegram, which boasts 1 billion active users worldwide, offers Russia a useful tool to cultivate “soft power” and push favorable narratives. While Russian government agencies and information-warfare groups will likely continue to use Telegram, the crackdown could undermine Russia’s international image and attenuate links between Russians and Russian-speakers abroad.

The third cost is economic. Russia’s digital crackdown risks accelerating a brain drain that began with the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. For Moscow’s tech sector, Telegram is more than a messaging app, it is a channel for professional networks and independent media. Strangling it while designing a state-controlled alternative, sends a clear message to Russians: the digital noose is tightening. Around 100,000 Russian IT professional fled the country by the end of 2022. Each incremental restriction on the country’s digital environment raises the probability that those who stayed will reconsider.

The United States should not make the mistake of treating Russia’s digital iron curtain as a purely internal matter. When Russian’s lose access to independent information, the Kremlin’s ability to sustain public support for the war against Ukraine and to suppress domestic dissent only grows stronger. A Russian population that can access uncensored news is a strategic asset for Washington. One confined to state-controlled information ecosystems is not. The United States has a direct interest in making sure the curtain does not fully close.

To do so, Washington should increase support for the tools that can help Russians bypass government restrictions. The Open Technology Fund (OTF) supports VPNs and secure browsers that serve millions of Russian users. After Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the number of daily users of OTF-sponsored VPNs in Russia reportedly surged from 48,000 to over a million.

Despite this reach, OTF received only $43.5 million last year through the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), roughly 5% of USAGM’s previous budget of about $860 million. The Trump administration has already signaled its desire to gut USAGM. Rather than simply cutting the agency, Congress should revist that decision and instead reallocate a meaningful portion of USAGM’s now-reduced budget toward OTF and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL). RFE/RL reaches an estimated 10 million people across Russia. Making it one of the most effective instruments the United States has for reaching audiences behind the Kremlin’s information wall. The administration’s effort to freeze RFE/RL’s funding and shut off its satellite broadcasts into Russia has handed Moscow a gift it could not have engineered on its own. OTF also has a complementary record of reaching through authoritarian censorship at a cost-effective rate of only 0.07 cents per user per month. Both programs are among the cheapest instruments Washington has to penetrate the information fortress Moscow is attempting to create.

Some of Russia’s most outspoken cheerleaders, military bloggers, are already complaining about Roskomnadzor’s latest restrictions. Their lament is not misplaced. Moscow is indicating that it is choosing regime security over military effectiveness, over soft power, and over human capital. The goal for the United States should be clear, widen the cracks Moscow is making and keep the curtain from fully closing.

Reagan Easter is a senior communications associate at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). She previously worked with Homeland Security Investigations and holds a degree in International Affairs from The George Washington University. Follow FDD on X @FDD. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.