# Censorship detected in RU

**Country:** 🇷🇺 Russia (RU)
**Date:** 2026-05-16
**Type:** Censorship
**Severity:** CRITICAL
**Status:** suspected

## Summary

None

## Metrics

- Confidence: 87%
- Measurements: 16
- Anomaly Rate: 93.6%

## Evidence

- **OONI** (measurement): OONI signal: 644/735 measurements anomalous (87.6%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=signal&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI whatsapp: 258/296 measurements anomalous (87.2%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=whatsapp&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI telegram: 238/258 measurements anomalous (92.2%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 87%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=telegram&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI tor: 238/264 measurements anomalous (90.2%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 86%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=tor&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI signal: 790/904 measurements anomalous (87.4%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=signal&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI whatsapp: 296/337 measurements anomalous (87.8%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=whatsapp&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI telegram: 277/296 measurements anomalous (93.6%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 87%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=telegram&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI tor: 280/305 measurements anomalous (91.8%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 87%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=tor&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI signal: 686/800 measurements anomalous (85.8%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 84%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=signal&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI whatsapp: 273/319 measurements anomalous (85.6%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 84%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=whatsapp&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI telegram: 256/290 measurements anomalous (88.3%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=telegram&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI tor: 252/282 measurements anomalous (89.4%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 86%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=tor&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI signal: 458/521 measurements anomalous (87.9%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=signal&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI whatsapp: 216/246 measurements anomalous (87.8%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=whatsapp&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI telegram: 187/212 measurements anomalous (88.2%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=telegram&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)
- **OONI** (measurement): OONI tor: 194/220 measurements anomalous (88.2%)
  - Observed: 2026-05-16
  - Confidence: 85%
  - [OONI Explorer (independently verifiable)](https://explorer.ooni.org/search?probe_cc=RU&test_name=tor&since=2026-05-16&until=2026-05-17&only=anomalies)

## What we cannot say

- **Who caused it** — measurement data alone does not attribute the interference to any government, ISP, or other actor.
- **Intent** — anomalous or unreachable measurements indicate interference, not a stated motive or a deliberate-vs-incidental determination.
- **Which networks** — no specific ASN/ISP is identified for this incident.
- **The mechanism** — we cannot state whether this was DNS tampering, TLS/SNI reset, HTTP blockpage, throttling, or an infrastructure outage.
- **Sub-national scope** — measurement is aggregated at the country level; we cannot localize to a province, city, or network segment.
- **Independent corroboration** — this rests on a single source; treat it as a single-source signal, not a multi-source confirmation.

## Data Sources

ooni

## Citation

Voidly Research. (2026). Censorship detected in RU [RU-2026-2925]. Retrieved from https://voidly.ai/incident/RU-2026-2925

---
*Report generated by Voidly Research on 2026-08-05*
*Data licensed under CC BY 4.0*
*Incident ID: RU-2026-2925*
*Permalink: https://voidly.ai/incident/RU-2026-2925*