Internet blockade confronts Russian elite and sinks Putin's popularity

MoscowA Russian influencer from Monaco has shaken up public debate in Moscow like it hasn't been shaken in a long time. In a video addressed to Vladimir Putin, Viktoriia Boniia, a former contestant on Dom-2, Russian Big Brother, warned the president that people and leaders "are afraid of him" and "don't tell him the truth." One of the reasons for her complaints was the growing internet blockages, the last straw for the patience of citizens, tired of four years of war and an increasingly worsening economic situation.

This celebrity has unexpectedly positioned herself as a spokesperson for social discontent and has even forced the Kremlin to respond. Russian government spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has surprisingly accepted the criticism and has committed to working on the problems she denounced. The controversy has also reached Parliament, where the communist leader, Gennady Zyuganov, has expressed offense that the government reacted to a celebrity's message while repeatedly ignoring the same demands from his party.

Russian media abroad have been discussing for days whether Boniia's appearance is an operation by the Kremlin's political faction, led by Sergey Kiriyenko, especially after the influencer posted another video thanking Putin tearfully for responding to her call. The presidential administration is concerned that Putin's popularity has dropped ten points since January, from 75% to 65%, the lowest figure since the start of the invasion of Ukraine, while his party, United Russia, is approaching its historical low with 27% of support. This is despite the authorities setting a goal for the autumn legislative elections to achieve 60% of the votes.

The other side of the coin are the systemic opposition parties, which are growing by championing the discourse against internet restrictions. According to the independent media

Viorstka, they all have to coordinate their criticism with Kiriyenko, but the fact that they are allowed to attack the Russian president's decisions to a certain extent indicates that the Kremlin's political bloc is trying to send an alarm message to Putin to react and back down. The reason is that for this faction, social networks, especially Telegram

, are fundamental for influencing people's opinions on the eve of an election campaign.

However, sociologist Lev Gudkov points out to ARA that the president is immune to these wake-up calls. “He does not trust the survey data, he only trusts what the FSB [the secret services] tells him, which only shows him what he wants to see”. From his point of view, the security services “control” Putin because they provide him with one image or another of reality so that he makes the decisions that best favor their interests.

Clash in the Kremlin towers

This is what happened in the case of internet outages. The Russian economic newspaper The Bell assures that behind these measures is the Second Service of the FSB, "the most sinister unit of the secret services", responsible for the poisoning of Aleksei Navalni in 2020. Its head, Colonel General Aleksei Sedov, is the one who has managed to convince Putin of the importance of restricting communications. Both coincided in the KGB in Leningrad in the 1980s, both are septuagenarians, and both despise the internet. In fact, it is known that the Russian president has neither a smartphone, nor a computer, nor social networks.

The Kremlin's political bloc sees itself attacked by the FSB and has no way to stop its accumulation of power. According to analyst Tatiana Stanóvaia, writing for the Carnegie Eurasia Center, "the path to digital control is being implemented without their approval and against their wishes," but "the elite's own resistance provokes an even harsher response from the security forces." "Public objections from loyalists will be met with more repression," she concludes.

Business elites are also bewildered. Technology companies are being forced to take on the fight against VPNs —applications that allow circumventing digital censorship— under threat of sanctions. Even the head of the employers' association that groups Russian oligarchs told Putin that the restrictions had complicated business life and asked for solutions. The Kremlin leader didn't even flinch.

A new 1917?

The communist leader has warned that if the Russian president does not take urgent measures to stop social unrest, we could see a revolution “like that of 1917” in the autumn. “We have no right to repeat it”, he added to make it clear that it was not a threat. Sociologist Gudkov is less alarmist and believes there will be “no wave of protests” because the majority of people are ‘loyal’ to the government and “irritation is not channeled towards the top leaders”.

Meanwhile, nothing suggests that Putin's political environment will make him change his mind. “We are doing this to prevent terrorist attacks and the safety of people is the top priority”, the president recently assured. In the Kremlin's language, this means that the course is set, that the secret services are getting their way, and that it is better to adapt to the new reality.