Russia’s internet censor just escalated again. On August 4, 2026, users across the country reported severe, simultaneous connectivity issues affecting more than 20 popular VPN services, in what one Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) executive described as “the largest [blocking operation] in history.” Connectivity appeared partially restored for some services by August 5, but the underlying campaign shows no sign of slowing down.
What actually happened
According to reporting from TechRadar, citing the independent outlet Meduza, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s state communications regulator, deployed a new blocking method that targets the IP address ranges and entire subnets of major hosting providers, rather than blocking individual VPN server addresses one at a time. Because many VPN services lease server infrastructure from the same handful of large hosting companies, blocking a hosting provider’s entire subnet takes out every VPN using that infrastructure in one move, along with, in some cases, unrelated services sharing the same address ranges.
This is a meaningfully different tactic than the app-level detection Russian platforms like Ozon and Kinopoisk began rolling out this spring, which we covered in our earlier report on Russia’s shift to app-level VPN blocking. That earlier move had individual services checking for and rejecting VPN traffic themselves. This new wave operates at the infrastructure level, upstream of any individual app or website, which makes it harder for any single VPN provider to route around by simply changing server IPs within the same hosting environment.
The scale of the campaign
This is not an isolated event. Roskomnadzor has been steadily escalating VPN blocking efforts throughout 2026, following a pattern of more blocks in 2026 than in 2025, and more in 2025 than in 2024. In late February 2026, the regulator reported limiting access to 469 VPN services nationwide. By some accounts, deep packet inspection systems used to detect and throttle VPN traffic are updated by operators nearly every week, an arms race that shows no sign of a ceiling.
Russia has separately continued to loosen restrictions in narrow, specific ways, including scrapping a proposed VPN tax earlier in 2026, while simultaneously tightening blanket access. The two tracks reflect a state that wants VPN technology available for its own institutional and business uses while making it as difficult as possible for the general public to access blocked platforms.
The DDoS allegations
Separately from the subnet-blocking campaign, TechRadar has previously reported allegations that Roskomnadzor has engaged in active denial-of-service attacks against VPN services directly, rather than solely relying on passive blocking of traffic at the network level. If accurate, this would represent an escalation beyond blocking access to VPN infrastructure and toward actively degrading or disabling it, a materially more aggressive posture than filtering alone. Roskomnadzor has not confirmed these allegations, and independent verification of attribution for DDoS activity is inherently difficult, but the pattern is consistent with the broader trend of Russia treating VPN access as a direct adversary to be disabled rather than merely filtered.
Why blocking entire subnets is harder to work around
Individual IP or domain blocking is a game VPN providers have played against censors for years, rotate the server’s IP address, and traffic gets through again until the new address is discovered and blocked too. Blocking an entire hosting provider’s subnet skips that cycle. Every server a VPN operates within that address range goes dark simultaneously, regardless of how recently any individual IP was provisioned.
For VPN providers, the practical response is diversifying server infrastructure across many different hosting providers and cloud regions, so that no single subnet block takes out a meaningful share of their network. Providers with large, geographically and infrastructurally diverse server fleets, rather than concentrated deployments with a handful of hosting partners, are better positioned to absorb this kind of attack.
Want to compare all VPNs side by side? Check our full VPN comparison table with scores across 18 criteria.
Timeline of the August 4-5 disruption
August 4: Users across Russia begin reporting widespread, simultaneous VPN connectivity failures, affecting more than 20 services. August 4-5: FBK and independent monitors describe the operation as the largest blocking campaign to date, attributing it to a new subnet-level targeting method rather than individual server or domain blocking. August 5: Partial connectivity restoration reported for some affected services, though the underlying blocking infrastructure and methodology remain in place for future use.
How VPN providers are responding
Providers with a significant Russian user base have historically responded to blocking waves like this one by rapidly rotating server infrastructure, adding new hosting partners, and prioritizing obfuscated protocol development specifically to survive exactly this kind of DPI-driven, subnet-level blocking. Given the scale of this particular operation, described by observers as the largest yet, expect a similar scramble in the days following August 4, with some providers restoring partial access faster than others depending on how concentrated their existing infrastructure was within the targeted hosting ranges.
This is also likely to accelerate a trend already underway across the VPN industry: providers increasingly treating obfuscation and infrastructure diversification not as optional extras for a niche subset of users, but as core, always-on features given how unpredictable and fast-moving state-level blocking campaigns like Russia’s have become throughout 2026.
What this means if you’re in Russia or connecting to services there
If you rely on a VPN to reach the open internet from within Russia, expect continued instability rather than a single, permanent block. Providers actively fighting this kind of censorship typically publish status updates when service is disrupted, and obfuscated or stealth-protocol connections (designed specifically to disguise VPN traffic as ordinary HTTPS) tend to hold up longer against subnet-level blocking than standard connections, though nothing is fully immune once an entire hosting range goes dark.
The broader pattern across 2026
This event doesn’t sit in isolation. Earlier this year we covered how Russian platforms including Ozon and Kinopoisk began independently detecting and blocking VPN users at the application level, and separately, Russia’s decision to scrap a proposed VPN tax earlier in 2026 shows a government pursuing tighter access control through multiple, sometimes contradictory channels at once, tightening infrastructure-level blocking while abandoning fiscal measures that might have driven users toward legal, taxed alternatives instead. Together, these moves paint a picture of blocking-as-primary-strategy, rather than a coherent regulatory framework balancing access against control.
This is an escalation, not a one-off outage. Roskomnadzor's shift to blocking entire hosting subnets is a more effective censorship tool than prior IP-by-IP blocking, and it's part of a steadily intensifying campaign that has run through all of 2026. Anyone depending on a VPN to reach the open internet from Russia should expect continued disruption and prioritize providers with large, diversified infrastructure and obfuscation features built specifically for high-censorship environments.
Keep reading: Russia’s VPN Crackdown Just Changed Tactics and Best VPN for Russia in 2026.