Russia’s mobile internet speed fell last month from a year earlier, as sanctions by the US and its allies to punish Moscow over the war in Ukraine have choked off technology imports.
(Bloomberg) — Russia’s mobile internet speed fell last month from a year earlier, as sanctions by the US and its allies to punish Moscow over the war in Ukraine have choked off technology imports.
The average download speed outside of Moscow fell 7% in February to 18.3 megabits per second as operators were forced to rely on equipment bought before hostilities began, Denis Kuskov, the head of Russian researcher TelecomDaily, said Wednesday.
The global average download speed was 38 megabits per second in January, and over 100 countries posted speeds greater than Russia’s regions, according to Speedtest Global Index data.
The US, European Union and other allies have targeted technology imports, financial institutions and individuals since the invasion a year ago in an effort to disrupt Russia’s ability to wage war and undermine its economy. While the measures focus on dual-use technology that have military applications, they have also hit telecommunications equipment needed to maintain network infrastructure.
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Moscow was the one exception to the countrywide slowdown, with the download speed there rising 32% to 34.7 megabits per second last month, according to a TelecomDaily report published Wednesday. The increase was due to people in the Russian capital using less data as the government blocked access to many foreign websites, Kuskov said.
“For the first time in history, against the backdrop of blocking foreign internet resources, the volumes in Russia have stopped growing” for mobile data, Kuskov said.
Russian authorities blocked a record 234,000 websites last year, up 80% from 2021, according to internet monitoring group Roskomsvoboda. Blocked sites include Meta Platforms Inc.’s Facebook and Instagram.
TelecomDaily’s data comes from its Megabitus app, which was released in 2021 and tests internet speeds from tens of thousands of devices in hundreds of cities across Russia.
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