Русский
The beginning of the week brought an unpleasant surprise to Ukrainian Internet users. The fact is that according to a decree by Petro Poroshenko, Ukraine is imposing sanctions against the largest Russian Internet companies for up to three years. They include some of the most popular social networks in the CIS - "VKontakte" and "Odnoklassniki".At the same time, on the official page of the President of Ukraine appeared a record in which Poroshenko urged Ukrainian users to stop using Russian services for security purposes. He explains his decision by the need to increase efficiency in the fight against Russian propaganda on the Internet. Other resources of Mail.ru Group, as well as products of Yandex, were also included in the sanctions list. Interestingly, the blocking will also affect such popular services as Yandex.Money, Yandex.Maps, Yandex.Music, Yandex.Translator, Yandex.Taxi, as well as many others, including those necessary for the work of Ukrainian companies. According to the company's representatives, the new sanctions will not have a negative impact on its business, and only ordinary Internet users will suffer from them. Interestingly, the blocking also affects the websites of "Kaspersky Lab" and DrWeb, as well as one of the most famous publishers of electronic dictionaries - ABBYY. A representative of the latter has already commented on the situation and said that the company is informed about the decision of the Ukrainian authorities and is studying the possible impact of its consequences on the company. It is worth adding that the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, Alexander Turchinov, has already called on Ukrainian Internet service providers to start blocking Russian websites that are on the sanctions list, without waiting for an official letter from the SBU. Despite the statement by Oleksandr Fedienko, chairman of the Internet Association of Ukraine, that such blocking is not technically possible at the moment, the first complaints about the inaccessibility of Russian social networks appeared on the Web. At the same time, the number of resources detailing methods of access to favorite resources to bypass the ban is also growing. The social network "VKontakte" is no exception, whose representatives are sending instructions to Ukrainian users on how to bypass the blocking. Many Internet users are still arguing about whether Russian services will be blocked in Ukraine, or the technical possibility to do so will not appear, and the loud statement will be forgotten by itself. But even if access to certain resources will be blocked, bypassing such a blocking will not be difficult. And whether Ukrainian users will have to look for ways around it, we will find out in the next few days.