{"id":159802,"date":"2026-04-05T16:12:49","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T16:12:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/durov-russias-vpn-ban-caused-payment-system-issues"},"modified":"2026-04-05T16:46:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T16:46:27","slug":"durov-russias-vpn-ban-caused-payment-system-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/durov-russias-vpn-ban-caused-payment-system-issues","title":{"rendered":"Durov: Russia&#8217;s VPN Ban Caused Payment System Issues"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"ap-article-header-tag\"> <strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Kenya. <\/strong> <\/span>Telegram&#8217;s billionaire founder, \u200cPavel Durov, said on Saturday that Russia&#8217;s attempt to block Virtual Private Networks (VPN) triggered a problem with a domestic payment system, adding that tens of millions of Russians were resisting \u200bdigital controls.<\/p>\n<p>Russia has repeatedly blocked mobile internet and granted sweeping powers \u200bto cut off mass communications while jamming messenger services and VPNs in \u2060what diplomats have called a &#8220;great crackdown&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Friday&#8217;s technical problem, which Russia has yet to fully \u200bexplain, sowed chaos for some shoppers, forcing the Moscow metro to allow entry \u200bwithout payment through its turnstiles, while a regional zoo had to ask visitors to use cash.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Welcome back to the Digital Resistance, my Russian brothers and sisters,&#8221; Durov said on Telegram.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The entire \u200bnation is now mobilised to bypass these absurd restrictions.<\/p>\n<p>&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Russia&#8217;s biggest bank, Sberbank, said \u200bthere was a technical issue on Friday but gave no details.<\/p>\n<p>Some Russian media deleted \u200creports \u2060that the outage stemmed from state bids to block certain sites or VPNs.<\/p>\n<p>Russian officials say the clampdown on VPNs and messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Telegram is essential for security as Moscow faces deadly attacks deep inside Russia from \u200bUkraine and alleged attempts \u200bat sabotage by \u2060Western intelligence agencies.<\/p>\n<p>Russia has slowed down Telegram, opens new tab, which has more than 1 billion active users and is also widely used in \u200bUkraine, and investigated Durov in a criminal case involving accusations \u200bof terrorism.<\/p>\n<p>Russian \u2060officials said Telegram had been penetrated by Ukraine and NATO member intelligence agencies, and that Russian soldiers had died as a result.<\/p>\n<p>Telegram has denied such penetration, saying \u2060Moscow is \u200btrying to force Russians to use MAX, \u200ba state-backed messenger app schools and universities have been told to use.<\/p>\n<p>The Kremlin&#8217;s push towards such an app \u200bupset some Russians, Reuters reported on Friday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ap-article-footer-note\">Find more news and analyses on <span class=\"ap-highlight-country\">Kenya<\/span> on the <span class=\"ap-highlight-brand\">Africa Press<\/span> website<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Kenya. Telegram&#8217;s billionaire founder, \u200cPavel Durov, said on Saturday that Russia&#8217;s attempt to block Virtual Private Networks (VPN) triggered a problem with a domestic payment system, adding that tens of millions of Russians were resisting \u200bdigital controls. Russia has repeatedly blocked mobile internet and granted sweeping powers \u200bto cut off mass communications while [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":159801,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,9],"tags":[544],"class_list":["post-159802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-miscellaneous","tag-kenya"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Durov: Russia&#039;s VPN Ban Caused Payment System Issues - kenya<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"-article-header-tag&quot;&gt; Africa-Press - Kenya. 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