Russia is pushing its Max messenger — a social media platform without encryption — onto its citizens with a massive promotion campaign and the simultaneous blocking of Whatsapp and Telegram, the country’s two most popular messenger apps.
The rollout has raised concerns among critics and digital rights groups that Moscow would use Max to surveil its citizens and further cut digital links to the West.
“Any data that passes through this application can be considered to be in the hands of its owner, and in this case, the hands of the Russian state,” said cybersecurity researcher Baptiste Robert, CEO of the French company Predicta Lab.
Photo: AFP
Launched last year by Russian social media giant VK, the app has been compared to China’s WeChat, combining social media and messaging functions with access to government services, a digital ID card system, banking and payments.
It is not officially mandatory, but the authorities are making it clear that life without Max would become increasingly hard.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has touted it as a more “secure” platform that meets the nation’s demand for “technological sovereignty.”
Moscow has been pushing that agenda for years.
“This is the culmination of policies aimed at creating a sovereign Internet,” said Marielle Wijermars, an associate professor of Internet governance at Maastricht University.
“Russia wants to restructure the Internet to better control what is published,” including “by migrating all Russians to platforms that are more state-controlled,” she added.
Max has been pre-installed on phones and tablets sold in Russia since September. The design is familiar and resembles Telegram, offering private messages, public channels and cute stickers.
Unlike Telegram and Whatsapp, it is on Russia’s “white list” of approved digital services that stay online during the increasingly common forced Internet blackouts that Moscow says are necessary to thwart Ukrainian retaliatory drone attacks.
Initially only available to users with a Russian or Belarusian SIM card, the app is now available in English and to those with phone numbers from 40 other countries — only those Russia deems “friendly,” such as Cuba, Pakistan and ex-Soviet republics in Central Asia. It is not available in the EU — or Ukraine. That has not stopped Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy vowing to infiltrate the app.
One of the reasons Russia wants to ditch Telegram is because it has become a platform used by Ukraine to recruit Russians for sabotage attacks, including assassinations. Inside Russia, opinions are split.
“You can send messages, photos and videos. What more do you need?” said Yekaterina, a 35-year-old dance teacher.
However, Irina, a 45-year-old doctor, complained that she has been “forced” to use Max for school activities for her children and to access the government’s official online portal, Gosuslugi, where her patients make appointments.
She plans to “buy another SIM card to download Max on another phone.”
Large businesses have been accused of forcing employees to download the app and schools have migrated all communication with parents to the platform. Celebrities and popular bloggers are also moving their content to Max.
Dmitry Zakharchenko, founder of the Russian analytics agency GRFN, has compared the “aggressive” campaign with Soviet propaganda billboards.
The carrot-and-stick approach has driven downloads — more than 100 million users this month, according to the service.
The launch of Max comes years into Russia’s political and technological campaign to develop a “sovereign Internet,” less reliant on and vulnerable to foreign services.
Russian telecoms regulator Roskomnadzor and the security services have enjoyed growing powers to monitor and block sites they deem dangerous.
Unlike Telegram and Whatsapp, Max does not use end-to-end encryption and its terms of use state that user data are stored exclusively on services in Russia.
Varvara, a 35-year-old interpreter said she was not worried about that as she was not a “foreign agent” and had nothing to hide — referring to a label used by the Kremlin to target critics.
Even so, she has ditched Max in favor of IMO, a less popular US-made app that has encryption.
Scientist Alexandra, 32, refuses to download Max “out of contrariness” to its heavy-handed promotion.
“We’re already being watched everywhere,” she said, dismissing the privacy concerns.
However, another resistant user — Natasha, 48 — shows the general feeling of resignation when it comes to the future of the app in Russia.
“Sooner or later, there will be no alternative,” she said.
PHISHING: The con might appear convincing, as the scam e-mails can coincide with genuine messages from Apple saying you have run out of storage For a while you have been getting messages from Apple saying “your iCloud storage is full.” They say you have exceeded your storage plan, so documents are no longer being backed up, and photos you take are not being uploaded. You have been resisting Apple’s efforts to get you to pay a minimum of ￡0.99 (US$1.33) a month for more storage, but it seems that you cannot keep putting off the inevitable: You have received an e-mail which says your iCloud account has been blocked, and your photos and videos would be deleted very soon. To keep them you need
The Israeli military has demolished entire villages as part of its invasion of south Lebanon, rigging homes with explosives and razing them to the ground in massive remote detonations. The Guardian reviewed three videos posted by the Israeli military and on social media, which showed Israel carrying out mass detonations in the villages of Taybeh, Naqoura and Deir Seryan along the Israel-Lebanon border. Lebanese media has reported more mass detonations in other border villages, but satellite imagery was not readily available to verify these claims. The demolitions came after Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz called for the destruction of
A US YouTuber who caused outrage for filming himself kissing a statue commemorating Korean wartime sex slaves has been sentenced to six months in prison, a court in Seoul said yesterday. Johnny Somali, 25, gained notoriety several years ago for recording himself doing a series of provocative stunts in South Korea and Japan, and streaming them on platforms such as YouTube and Twitch. South Korean authorities indicted Somali — whose real name is Ramsey Khalid Ismael — in 2024 on public order violations and obstruction of business, and banned him from leaving the country. “The court has sentenced him to six months in
The death toll from a shooting in western Afghanistan rose to 11 on Saturday, after gunmen targeted civilians at a picnic spot in Herat, the provincial authority said. Bullet marks were visible on a wall of the Sayed Mohammad Agha Shia shrine, while bloodstains marked a blanket abandoned at the scene. “Eleven people have been recorded dead and eight others wounded from Friday’s incident, with the condition of two of the wounded reported as critical,” Herat’s information office said in a statement. The update raises a toll of seven killed provided on Friday by the Afghan Ministry of Interior Affairs
RSS