President Vladimir Putin signed into law a new measure giving Russia's main domestic intelligence agency new power to shut down the Internet inside the country.
The legislation, signed into law on February 20, was the latest in a series of regulations drastically tightening authorities' ability to restrict news and information inside of Russia.
The new measure, which was passed earlier this week by lawmakers, gives the Federal Security Service, known as the FSB, the power to demand that Internet service providers -- cellular or landline -- turn off or restrict access in cases "established by regulatory legal acts of the President of the Russian Federation."
The move allows Putin to personally decide when online communications in the country or a specific region should be turned off, without having to give a reason. It also removes any liability for the providers for doing so.
"Only the president can impose restrictions," Sarkis Darbinyan, a lawyer and longtime Internet activist, was quoted as saying. And presidential decrees are "even simpler than government decrees."
In recent months, Russian authorities have grappled with ways to stop Ukrainian drones from entering Russian airspace. In many cases, the drones use Russian data signals to fly at targets, in some cases over great distance.
Authorities have also clamped down on popular Internet tools, in particular messaging apps like WhatsApp and Telegram. Both apps have been throttled drastically amid a government push to get Russians to use a state-backed app called Max. One report said Telegram would be blocked entirely as of April 1.
Tech regulator Roskomnadzor accused Telegram, created by a now-exiled entrepreneur Pavel Durov, of creating a market for leaked personal information of Russian citizens.
The restrictions on Telegram have prompted pushback from bloggers who closely follow Russia's battlefield movements in Ukraine and raise money for Russian units. Telegram is also widely used by deployed Russian soldiers.
In an unusual warning, the FSB released a statement on February 21, asserting Ukrainian intelligence was able to access information posted on Telegram by Russian soldiers, and that "has repeatedly resulted in threats to the lives of service members" over the past three months.
