Representatives of Russia’s independent media and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) have asked leading technology companies to create an alliance of “engineers against dictators” to prevent the total shutdown of Russia’s online informational space.
The media representatives and RSF wrote an open letter on June 8 to the CEOs of Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Google, Twitter, and other companies to ask them to consider forming the alliance, which they said could help Russian citizens get access to uncensored information and prevent the Kremlin from disconnecting Russians from remaining independent media still operating in the country.
They said there is an urgent need to “reconnect Russian citizens with pluralistic information and with the rest of the world” especially with a presidential election scheduled to take place next year.
“The Russian authorities are preparing for Vladimir Putin's reelection in 2024. They will become increasingly intolerant of any discourse that contradicts the Kremlin’s official narrative,” the letter says.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February last year, most major social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram have been banned in Russia and the websites of other independent media outlets severely restricted.
An alliance of “engineers against dictators” could develop technical solutions to bring back the platforms, search engines, and apps that are the gateways to information, the letter says.
“It is essential to reinstate them; otherwise, Russian citizens will find themselves locked in the dark alone with their president,” the letter says.
The initiative is supported by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dmitry Muratov, editor in chief of the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta.
“Freedom of speech today is technology,” Muratov said in backing the "engineers against dictatorship" alliance.
Muratov said dangerous attempts were being made to destroy the means of delivering content to citizens, and an alliance of engineers could help reverse this.
The letter notes that most independent journalists have left Russia out of fears that their reporting risked breaking new anti-media laws, which call for harsh prison sentences for spreading "disinformation" about the Russian military.
It says that two major platforms remaining, through which Russian journalists try to inform their fellow citizens about the war in Ukraine, are Telegram and YouTube, and there are “strong suspicions” that they could be totally blocked in Russia as soon as this autumn.
The letter also suggests that the companies could allow domain fronting within cloud solutions to help Russians bypass censorship. Domain fronting diverts traffic to enable access to online media in case they are blocked.
Russian corporations still use the cloud for business, so Russian authorities would not be able to block domain fronting without incurring financial damage.
Another suggestion is promoting access to the companies’ blocked websites through the Tor browser by distributing the platforms’ URLs in ads. This would be “an excellent way to help Russian citizens access an uncensored online space,” the letter said.