As the Russia-Ukraine armed conflict entered its third day, Russia blocked access to Twitter, and the move was criticized as ‘blocking the flow of information.
Specifically, starting on Saturday morning, February 26 (local time), internet monitoring group NetBlocks recorded the inability to access Twitter on all major Russian telecommunications providers, including Rostelecom, MTS, Beeline, and MegaFon. This has been confirmed by many international reporters working in Russia.
The Twitter support team itself confirmed this with social media. At the same time, they also said they are “working hard to keep the [Twitter] service safe and accessible”.
Just a day earlier, the Russian government restricted Facebook in the country after the social network failed to comply with a request to remove restrictions imposed on four Russian media outlets. Meanwhile, Russian officials gave the reason they banned Facebook as a “violation of basic human rights”.
The situation that Twitter faces is said to be similar to Facebook. However, Russian officials have not yet given any relevant reasons or announcements.
Meanwhile, internet access in Ukraine continues as usual and there are no restrictions placed on the spread of information. In the past, many analysts were concerned that Russian forces could take over telecommunications infrastructure and “withdraw” the internet as the conflict intensified, but so far the loss of life in Ukraine has only occurred sporadically around the Kharkiv area and most were recovered quickly.
