YouTube traffic in Russia drops to 20 percent of pre-throttling levels, platform ‘de facto blocked’ in country
YouTube traffic in Russia has dropped to just 20 percent of the levels seen before the authorities began throttling the service, according to IT expert Mikhail Klimarev, director of the Internet Protection Society, who shared the data on his Telegram channel, ZaTelekom.
Klimarev analyzed traffic data from Google’s monitoring service and compiled a graph illustrating the YouTube “slowdown,” which shows that access to the platform has been severely restricted in recent days.
“Google’s monitoring service currently shows 8.5 traffic points from Russia. Before the ‘slowdown,’ it was 40 points. This means it’s now at roughly 20 percent of normal levels. […] YouTube is de facto blocked in Russia,” the ZaTelekom post reads.
Disruptions to YouTube in Russia have been ongoing since July 2024. That month, a source in Russia’s telecommunications industry told Meduza that the government was intentionally throttling the platform.
Russian officials have blamed YouTube’s problems on Google, claiming the slowdown stems from issues with the Google Global Cache service. Google, however, has denied these allegations.
In mid-December, users began reporting even more difficulties accessing the platform. A media industry source told RBC that “previously, it was only 30 percent blocked, and only on desktop versions, but starting in mid-December, they’ll intensify restrictions and completely block it, including the the mobile version.”
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