Is Putin Planning to Shut Off Russia's Internet?

Russian President Vladimir Putin is allegedly seeking the power to disconnect Russia from the internet. It's a tool that could be enacted in times of war, massive anti-government protests, or in order to protect Russians from Western countries like the United States or members of the European Union, depending on who you ask.

Putin and his security council are meeting Monday to discuss a way to disconnect Russia's internet should it be deemed necessary, reported the Russian business newspaper Vedomosti. The Ministry of Communications has allegedly been doing exercises to test vulnerabilities in Russia's internet and can now successfully disable IP addresses outside of Russia, an intelligence officer told the paper. All of this is being done in order to see if the Runet (Russia's internet) can operate on its own without Western web access, with the hope that it will be functional next year.

Putin would likely deny this, however, and attempt to justify disconnecting Russia's internet "by whipping up fears that it's the West that wants to disconnect Russia from the web," according to the unnamed industry experts Discovery News spoke with.

As if on cue, Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, denied that authorities have plans to disconnect the Internet, instead insisting this is a question for other countries to answer. He also added that Russia needs a way to protect itself from the West. (Note on the link, RT is news outlet Russia Today, which was launched in 2005 by Putin as a "PR campaign to improve its image in the eyes of the world.") Peskov cited the "unpredictability" of the Eastern Union and the United States before implying that these countries would in fact disconnect Russia from the Internet and not the other way around.

In a statement to RT, Russia's communications minister, Nikolay Nikiforov, said: "Russia is being addressed in a language of unilateral sanctions: first, our credit cards are being cut off; then the European Parliament says that they'll disconnect us from SWIFT. In these circumstances, we are working on a scenario where our esteemed partners would suddenly decide to disconnect us from the internet."

The unilateral sanctions Nikiforov speaks of were placed on Russia a few months ago, after Russia annexed the Ukrainian peninsula Crimea and began military operations throughout the western portion of the Ukraine.

Whether or not it is the West that disconnects Russia from the Internet or if it is Putin that does so is irrelevant, as both possibilities highlight the world's dependence on Western internet, a fact many countries, including Brazil and Germany, have been grumbling about since Snowden's revelations last year. Putin himself has expressed concern over the NSA spying on him via the web and the security of the internet in his country in the past.

Could Putin actually disconnect the Russian internet from the rest of the world if he wanted? A Russian spy expert named Andrei Soldatov told the Guardian it is technically possible given how few internet exchange points Russia has. It is unlikely that he will do this, however, because it would be bad for the various corporations and businesses in Russia who rely on the Western internet. Temporarily disconnecting the internet or blocking certain sites during mass protests (possibly caused by Putin's waning popularity or the approaching Russian recession) is more likely.

Egypt, Iran, Syria, China, the United Kingdom, and, most recently, Thailand, have all blocked Facebook at various points because protesters were using it to organize. The same could be said for Twitter, with various countries blocking the microblogging service during times of political unrest, including Venezuela this year. The US and the EU have yet to disconnect a country from the web as a punitive measure.