09/08/2024

Russia Throttles YouTube

It is popular with kids, celebrities and dissidents

Russians are losing access to YouTube, the last major Western social platform freely available in the country, cutting them off from information independent from the Kremlin and alarming internet freedom advocates, journalists and opposition activists.

The throttling of YouTube, widely used for everything including watching cartoons and exposés on government corruption, comes amid fears that Russia will also shut down the Telegram messenger app after its founder, Pavel Durov, was detained by France.

The move comes as Russia is increasingly cracking down on any alternative sources of information, especially online, and has been pushing its citizens away from foreign-based social media apps to locally developed ones over which it has tighter control, such as its video-streaming alternative RuTube.

Please select this link to read the complete article from The Washington Post.