How does a country’s internet collapse overnight? Just ask Russia. On March 20, 2025, millions of Russians woke up to find their digital world had fundamentally vanished. Discord? Gone. Twitch? Nope. Figma, Duolingo, even government services like Gosuslugi? All suddenly inaccessible.
The digital guillotine fell at midnight, leaving Russians staring at error screens where their online lives used to exist.
The culprit wasn’t some mysterious cyber attack. It was their own government. Roskomnadzor, Russia’s telecommunications watchdog, decided to block Cloudflare, the U.S.-based service that provides DDoS protection and speeds up access for roughly 20% of Russian websites. Well, that went well. Not.
Users reported that 90% of their internet became inaccessible. Over 10,000 complaints flooded in within 24 hours. Discord alone received 1,366 complaints in a single hour. Gamers couldn’t access Genshin Impact or League of Legends. Students couldn’t use educational tools. Even VPNs, the typical workaround for government censorship, stopped working.
Every major telecom player felt the pain – Rostelecom, MTS, MegaFon, Beeline, T-2, Yota, and MGTS all reported massive disruptions. This isn’t the first time Russians have faced connectivity issues, as a similar major internet outage occurred on January 8, 2025. Download speeds plummeted. Mobile and desktop users were equally affected.
Roskomnadzor’s explanation? “Failures in Cloudflare infrastructure.” Right. The same infrastructure they deliberately blocked. They’re now pushing Russian organizations to use domestic hosting providers instead. Because nothing says “reliable service” like being forced to use the only option available.
The real issue is Cloudflare’s Encrypted Client Hello technology, which Roskomnadzor claims violates Russian law by bypassing access restrictions. Cloudflare was officially listed as an “information organizer” in February 2025, setting the stage for this crackdown.
Users were particularly upset about losing access to the lottery service Stoloto, which had become an important distraction during these uncertain times.
Now Russia’s digital environment faces an uncertain future. The government plans inspections next month and is pushing for “technological sovereignty.” Meanwhile, regular Russians just want their internet back.
The message is clear: in the battle between government control and internet freedom, everyday users are the collateral damage. And there’s nothing they can do about it.
