Russia wants to isolate itself from the world: it will disconnect from the internet for a day to test its exclusive network

Cybersecurity This is the key that Vladimir Putin knows very well. And more so when his country, Russia, is pointed out by all the states whenever there is a cyberattack. Spying on the Internet is a vital matter, in which the Russian Government has been working for several years. Your goal is to browse an “independent” internet. A exclusively Russian network that no one is able to intercept.

The National Digital Economy Program This is the new regulation that Russia has been working on for a long time, as the portal «ZDNet» recalls. In fact, in 2017, they announced that they planned to channel 95% of all internet traffic locally by 2020. Now comes the first litmus test: April 1 is the deadline to present amendments to said law, so that the Russian disconnection from the internet will occur before that day.

Russian authorities and major internet providers plan to disconnect the country from the Net as part of a planned experiment, the Russian news agency RosBiznesKonsalting (RBK) reported last week.

During such disconnection, as much information as possible will be gathered and feedback and modifications will be provided ahead of the law that the Russian Parliament approved in December 2018.

A first draft ordered that Russian network providers should guarantee the independence of the Russian internet space (Runet) in the event of foreign aggression with the aim of disconnecting the country from the rest of the internet.

This will also force Russian telecommunications companies to install your own means to redirect all traffic Russian to exchange points approved or administered by Roskomnazor, Russia’s telecommunications watchdog.

Technical problems

Roskomnazor will be in charge of inspecting all traffic to block prohibited content. But more importantly, it will ensure that traffic between Russian users stays within the country. without going through servers located abroad, where the information could be intercepted.

It was at the end of last January when the Russian government approved the disconnection experiment. Natalya Kaspersky, co-founder of the cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab, chairs the group investigating the proposal, which also includes major Russian telecommunications companies such as MegaFon, Beeline, MTS or RosTelecom.

As reported by the Russian agency RBK, all internet providers agreed with the objectives of the law, but not on its technical implementation as they believe it will cause significant disruptions to Russian internet traffic. During the test disconnection they will find out how their networks would react.

The Putin government will bear all the expenses derived from this test. Its ultimate goal is to implement a web traffic filtering system, such as the Great Firewall of China, but also have its own fully functioning intranet in case the country needs to disconnect.