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The Russian people have essentially lost access to the internet

33 points by itvision ↗ HN
It's strange that this went unnoticed, but on June 9, 2025, RosKomNadzor —- a government agency that regulates internet access —- essentially made the "outside" Internet inaccessible to Russians and turned the Internet into what's been recently called "Cheburnet", a derogatory term that means the Russian only segment of the wider Internet.

Below is a list of popular websites that you can no longer access:

    * slashdot.org
    * arstechnica.com
    * coingecko.com
    * disqus.com (and all the embedded Disqus discussions on the Internet)
    * forums.developer.nvidia.com
    * osnews.com
This list is not exhaustive, we are talking about millions of websites.

In addition to that, you cannot use DNS over HTTPs (DoH) with the most popular web companies, including and not limited to:

    * CloudFlare
    * OpenDNS
    * Google
DNS over TLS (DoT) is still working however it is not enabled by default in most operating systems. As a result, RKN has not yet started blocking it.

In addition to that, the OpenVPN and WireGuard protocols have essentially been disabled for years. What's new is that on June 9, the plain ShadowSocks protocol was disabled as well.

I've spoken with three major ISPs in Russia: Dom.ru (ER-Telecom), RosTelecom (RTK), and Megafon. They all deny any wrongdoing, claiming, "It doesn't depend on us." However, it totally does, as RKN has made them use their DPI equipment.

Some essential reads (in Russian): <https://neolurk.org/wiki/Чебурнет> <https://pikabu.ru/story/ya_uzhe_v_cheburnete_12833310> <https://otvet.mail.ru/question/267177907> <https://www.reddit.com/r/KafkaFPS/comments/1l9i1x0/с_праздничком_товарищи_прихожу_я_сейчас_на/>

20 comments

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toomuchtodo
Does Tor still work?
itvision
It either doesn't connect at all, or the speed is horrible. Most websites simply don't load unless they send a few kilobytes of text without any dependencies, such as JS, CSS, images, or built-in fonts.

Currently, SSH tunneling (`ssh -L/-D`) is the only reliable way to access the internet.

drysine
Come on, there is at least one major fixed line internet provider at which Tor works just fine. You need to use obfs4 bridges.
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throwaway843
X-Ray can become your friend, vless, vmess, trojan, etc. It's a pity these VPN-like protocols are largely unknown in the west.

Shadowsocks, including outline, has long been dead.

itvision
Proxying via HTTPS/TLS is working great, but RKN has started shutting down remote IPs/hosts that send "too much data" (whatever that means to them).
DanAtC
As a personal complaint, in the west it's hard to understand what any of those words mean or where to find an authoritative source. I can't read sites like https://xtls.github.io/
mmh0000
FYI there's a link, in English, right at the top to change the language:

https://xtls.github.io/en/

DanAtC
The translations are... not great. A lot of flowery language that doesn't explain much.
drtgh
Authoritarian governments block most of the internet, and as part of this they block VPNs also. Therefore people had to develop client/server protocols to mimic normal browsing packets in order to access the VPNs.

But, those governments constantly adapt their internet sniffing to detect such traffic and block it, so people's day-to-day internet browsing routine is "Which new protocol is working this month?"

DanAtC
How does one keep up-to-date on all the different protocols? How can you trust one over another?
drtgh
I don't need it at the moment (European), so I'm not updated. But awaiting someone else's answer, it is not difficult to get to grips with the matter, I suggest start with a "XRay vs Trojan" search, they are proxy servers (Trojan is GFW or GO) and visit all the links about the matter (any language, Chinese included, under several search engines), paying attention to the user's comments about the used protocols ( VMess, VLESS, XTLS, REALITY, VISION, and so on), different tools, clients, and searching again about them within a deep loop search.

> How can you trust one over another?

Even though those protocols and tools are open source, I would take it easy, read the code, search for analyses about it, trying make sure that nothing is happening in the background (my sincere apologies to the authors), and after this compile it my self. I would use a dedicated machine for it, not my main computer, and monitor the traffic. I mean, I would not install/use them without minimal checking first.

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pabs3
Does archive.org still work? Perhaps folks could use Save Page Now to access some of the wider internet.
drysine
Out of the 6 sites you listed only the last one fails to open for some reason. Tor works too.

Regarding "essential reads" - have you heard of Ukrainian drones controlled via mobile internet? Expect mobile internet to be off from time to time. That's the reality we live in until Russia wins this war.

OTOH, I expect internet censorship to get stricter, like there are talks about blocking telegram again, and there is nothing good in it for us.