The share of unsuccessful requests for Telegram domains from Russia reached on average almost 80%, while in some federal districts this figure was close to 90%, the Kommersant newspaper wrote, citing data from the Merilo service.
Starting on the weekend of March 14-15, Telegram’s speed dropped significantly, the post notes. If previously photos and videos were uploaded intermittently in the messenger, now text messages will also be sent with a delay.
The share of unsuccessful requests varies from region to region, which the experts interviewed by Kommersant attribute to the peculiarities of setting up equipment for traffic filtering. “Service providers are preparing equipment to filter traffic gradually and at different speeds: in some places the systems are already working at full capacity, in other places they are in the testing phase,” according to the Director of Development and Operation of Communications Services at Telecom Exchange, Anastasia Bidgilova.
Technically, it’s very difficult to disable Telegram 100% due to the architecture, she believes, but “it’s very possible that we could get it to a state where it becomes impossible to use.”
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RBC and The Bell, citing sources, wrote that in early April they plan to completely block Telegram in Russia. Since the beginning of March, the number of complaints about the work of Telegram began to grow in the Russian Federation, and from March 14 to 15, the messenger stopped working for many users, which made it possible to talk about the beginning of the ban.