Russia’s state internet regulator, Roskomnadzor, blocked access to 1.289 million online pages in the past year, representing a 59% rise compared to 2024, as authorities enhanced monitoring and imposed stricter regulations on sensitive material.

The largest surge was observed in content related to circumvention tools, which soared by 1,235% to exceed 93,000 items, as reported by Roskomnadzor to the Vedomosti business newspaper on Monday.

Items associated with LGBTQ+ issues increased by 269%, totaling 170,300 instances, while posts related to alcohol sales rose by 190% to more than 18,700.

Other categories that experienced notable upticks in blockages included child pornography (up 131% to 155,600 instances), drug-related content (up 80% to 229,300), and material regarding “involvement of minors in illegal activities” (up 60% to 52,200).

Roskomnadzor’s oversight encompassed various social networks, including VKontakte, Odnoklassniki, Moi Mir, Mail.ru Answers, Rutube, TikTok, Likee, and Telegram.

The increase can be partly attributed to a broader classification of content as illegal by the authorities, as explained by Urvan Parfentiyev, coordinator of the Safe Internet Center, to Vedomosti.

Yelizaveta Belyakova, the head of the Alliance for the Protection of Children in the Digital Environment, indicated that previously unclear content, such as VPN services and alcohol advertisements, is now distinctly marked as illegal for minors.

Furthermore, the rise in blocked pages is linked to Roskomnadzor’s implementation of more sophisticated tools for text analysis, image recognition, and predictive analytics, according to Natalia Tylevich, CEO of Social Laboratory.

Read this article in Russian at The Moscow Times’ Russian edition.