WhatsApp and Telegram Blocked by Governments, VPN Downloads Surge
The wave of tightening global digital space is intensifying. The world’s most popular foreign instant messaging services, WhatsApp and Telegram, are now facing total blockades in several authoritarian and developing countries due to political and domestic security reasons. The aggressive steps taken by the respective governments have triggered mass panic among users. Inevitably, citizens are flocking to download Virtual Private Network (VPN) applications to find a ‘back alley’ to remain connected online to WhatsApp and Telegram.
Russia Blocks WhatsApp for ‘Digital Sovereignty’
The administration of Vladimir Putin has reportedly taken extreme measures to fully control the internet ecosystem in Russia by restricting access to Meta Platforms’ WhatsApp, as well as Telegram. Moscow is aggressively urging its citizens to switch to local instant messaging apps to reinforce the state’s jargon of digital sovereignty. However, instead of complying with the instructions, Russian citizens are choosing to wage a ‘guerrilla’ campaign using more complex technological solutions to evade state surveillance. Throughout March alone, data from the Russian daily newspaper Kommersant, cited by Reuters, recorded an explosion of up to 9.2 million downloads for popular VPN services on the Google Play Store. The VPN download figures skyrocketed up to 14 times compared to the same period the previous year. ‘We have never seen this level of adoption before,’ said Sarkis Darbinyan, a Russian internet freedom activist now based in Lisbon who has been labelled a ‘foreign agent’ by the Kremlin, as quoted by Reuters on Wednesday (24/6/2026). This tension occurs amid a plummeting public satisfaction rate with Putin’s administration, from 75.1% in February to 65.6% in April according to the state survey agency VTsIOM. Although Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has repeatedly asserted that internet control is necessary because Russia is trapped in an ‘existential clash’ with the West over the Ukraine conflict, prolonged internet disruptions have infuriated senior bureaucrats for hindering political coordination.
India Blocks Telegram, VPN Downloads Surge
Not only in the White Bear, the tightening of digital space is also spreading to South Asia. The Indian government officially imposed a temporary total blockade on Telegram starting mid-June. New Delhi cited security reasons, with local authorities concerned that the platform was being used by fraudsters to spread fake exam leaks ahead of the national undergraduate re-examination. Citing data from app intelligence firm Appfigures via Tech Crunch, this policy immediately triggered a 49% surge in VPN downloads in India within a single day after the blockade. The daily download volume soared from 139,000 to 208,000. Proton VPN recorded the largest download spike, skyrocketing 113% on the Apple App Store and rising 64% on the Google Play Store. It was followed by Turbo VPN, which rose 85% and 35% on the two app stores respectively. The regulatory windfall was also enjoyed by NordVPN, ExpressVPN, and the Canadian provider Windscribe, which recorded a record 100% surge in registrations from India. Besides hunting for VPNs, Indian citizens are also reportedly migrating to alternative messaging apps considered safer from the reach of government censorship. The Signal app recorded a 72% increase in downloads on the App Store and skyrocketed 322% on the Play Store, while Viber jumped 216%. The most fantastic surge was experienced by iMe—a third-party application connected to the Telegram ecosystem—where its average daily downloads exploded from just 827 to 50,900 on the Play Store overnight. On the other hand, Telegram’s management is not staying silent as its large market is locked down. The application is reportedly filing a lawsuit directly with the Delhi High Court, arguing that the government should specifically filter content deemed illegal rather than imposing a total ban.