‘There’s a 99-percent chance it will happen’

Meduza’s Kremlin sources say Russia is poised to ban WhatsApp in a bid to quell discontent

With some 97.4 million users, WhatsApp is Russia’s most popular messaging service. But according to Meduza’s sources, it will most likely be banned in the near future. This comes after Russian lawmaker Anton Gorelkin, the deputy head of the State Duma’s Information Policy Committee, said Friday that the Meta-owned messenger should “prepare to leave” the country. According to Gorelkin, the messaging app is “very likely” to be added to a list of software from “unfriendly” countries that the government is compiling on President Vladimir Putin’s orders. Although Meduza’s sources were unsure when WhatsApp would be blocked, they stated that the security forces are the ones lobbying for the ban. One source even suggested that the campaign is part of a wider crusade to restrict access to online information that could fuel further social discontent.

According to two Meduza sources close to Vladimir Putin’s administration and a source in the State Duma, WhatsApp is almost guaranteed to be blocked in Russia.

“There’s a 99-percent chance it will happen. We’ll save the one percent for ‘you never know,’” said one source close to the Kremlin. The one percent chance that the messenger won’t be blocked is due to WhatsApp’s popularity among Russians, this person explained. “Blocking [WhatsApp] will cause guaranteed discontent, and this is undesirable in the context of the government’s already falling ratings,” he said.

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“But it’s clear that no one will take to the streets because of a messenger,” this source continued.

[The authorities] will tell us to switch to Max for interacting with the government or government-adjacent entities. For [apartment] building or school chat groups, people will make the switch. For themselves, many will continue to communicate via VPN; a lot of people have gotten used to it already.

Max, a new messaging app from the Russian tech giant VK, has been heavily promoted in recent weeks, including with the help of popular Internet personalities. The push has come amid reports that the Russian authorities plan to block popular foreign messaging platforms and encourage the use of domestic alternatives. As Meduza reported previously, Russian lawmakers have also been laying the groundwork for a new super-app that would be closely integrated with government services.

This same source close to the Putin administration and the source in the State Duma both said that the Russian security services have been lobbying for blocking messaging apps. The Kremlin’s political bloc isn’t “interested” enough in WhatsApp to “fight for it,” they added.

“It’s a different story with Telegram — there are a lot of state-controlled or loyal channels, an entire infrastructure has been built,” explained the source close to the Putin administration, pointing to the Kremlin disinformation network Dialog as an example.

This contact point with a politicized audience is important ahead of the [2026] State Duma elections. Blocking [Telegram] would make this contact difficult. Critically minded individuals would continue to use it and seek information with the help of VPNs. But the more loyal ones would move away: dealing with something semi-forbidden is scary.

Meduza’s sources couldn’t say when exactly WhatsApp will be blocked. One even expressed doubts that the messenger could be blocked completely “without knocking out a bunch of stuff around it.”

The source in the State Duma linked the possible blocking of messaging apps, as well as the recent crusade against VPN advertising and searching for “extremist materials” online, with growing social discontent in Russia. As he explained,

Prices are rising, and people want to read more about this. Tax collection is being tightened, and there may be changes to the tax policy for the self-employed — and not in their favor. For the security forces, the logic is clear: if there are fewer channels for obtaining information, then there’s supposedly less discontent. Clearly, this isn’t the case, but they have their own ideas.

The Russian authorities outlawed WhatsApp’s parent company, Meta, as an “extremist organization” in March 2022. The company’s other social media apps, Facebook and Instagram, were subsequently blocked in Russia.