Apple removed about 60 additional virtual private network (VPN) apps from its Russian App Store between July and September, significantly more than the 25 acknowledging to have been removed by Russian authorities, according to a report released Tuesday by the Apple Censorship Project, which campaigns for greater transparency about Apple’s actions.
According to researchers at GreatFire, an organization that monitors online censorship in China, data shows that Apple quietly removed nearly 60 VPN services from its Russian App Store between July 4 and September 18, bringing the total number of VPN apps now unavailable in Russia to 98.
The report suggests the scale of online censorship in Russia is much larger than was realized when Russian media regulator Roskomnadzor announced in early July that it would block 25 VPN apps from the Russian App Store, including some of the world’s most popular services, including NordVPN, ExpressVPN and Proton VPN.
According to the report, GreatFire researchers found that more than 20% of VPN apps they tested were blocked in Russia, despite no official statement from Apple to that effect.
“By unilaterally restricting access to these critical tools without transparency or due process, Apple is aiding government censorship. We demand that Apple stand by its commitment to human rights and provide a clear explanation for these actions,” GreatFire said.
VPNs are security software that encrypt internet connections to mask a user’s location, allowing users to access content that may be restricted in their region, as well as hide the websites a user visits from national authorities, and are considered a linchpin in the fight to protect the internet from censorship by authoritarian regimes.
Russia introduced new legislation in March that makes it a criminal offence to distribute information on how to circumvent internet restrictions, including how to set up a VPN.
Russia has long been ranked as one of the countries with the least internet freedom by groups such as Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders, and the crackdown on VPNs is part of a trend of Russian online censorship that has intensified since the Ukraine war.
