Both Russia and Venezuela have blocked access to the encrypted messaging app Signal. .
Russian news service There have been reports of a blocking of the Signal app in Russia. The country’s communications watchdog Roskomnadzor said the app was restricted “for violating the requirements of Russian law on preventing the use of messengers for terrorist and extremist purposes,” according to a Russian report.
On Friday, cybersecurity tracker NetBlocks reported that Russia had restricted access to Signal on “most internet providers.” NetBlocks also noted that “the app is still usable even with ‘Bypass censorship’ enabled” in Signal’s settings, which resonated with users in both regions who were blocked from messaging.
The Signal blocking in Venezuela comes in the long shadow of the country’s disputed presidential election results in late July, when Venezuelan election authorities declared President Nicolás Maduro the winner without releasing evidence of his victory, sparking protests from both supporters and detractors of Maduro’s opponent, Edmundo Gonzalez. .
Both jurisdictions have blocked access to other similar social media apps as a way to stifle dissent, including earlier today for 10 days, when the company’s owner, Elon Musk, was accused of promoting hate and “violating” the social network’s rules. It also reported a “massive YouTube outage” in Russia on Thursday.
