The war in Ukraine is causing a major internet backbone provider to terminate business with its Russian customers, which is expected to disrupt and slow down internet connectivity across Russia.
US-based Cogent Communications began halting its business with Russian customers on Friday, according to The Washington Post. The company is doing so to prevent the Kremlin from using Cogent’s fiber networks to launch cyberattacks and spread propaganda justifying the government’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Our goal is not to hurt anyone. It’s just to not empower the Russian government to have another tool in their war chest,” Cogent’s CEO Dave Schaeffer told the newspaper.
The company also told PCMag that “Cogent has terminated its contracts with customers billing out of Russia,” citing the European Union’s recent effort to ban Russia’s state-sponsored media outlets, such as RT and Sputnik News, from spreading disinformation.
“Cogent is not otherwise restricting or blocking traffic originating from or destined for Russia. Cogent continues to provide services to Ukraine,” it said a statement.
Still, the company is effectively kicking off all Russian corporate customers from using its internet backbone services. According to the Post, Cogent has “several dozen customers in Russia,” including the state-owned telecommunications company Rostelecom, which markets itself as the country’s largest digital services provider. Two other customers include the Russian mobile carriers Megafon and Veon.
Cogent points out its Russian customers can migrate to other internet backbone providers. Nevertheless, the service termination is expected to drag down internet connectivity for Russian users over the ensuing days and weeks.
“Disconnecting their customers in Russia will not disconnect Russia, but it will reduce the amount of overall bandwidth available for international connectivity,” wrote Doug Madory at Kentik, a network monitoring company in San Francisco. “This reduction in bandwidth may lead to congestion as the remaining international carriers try to pick up the slack.”
The degraded bandwidth could also prevent many Russian users from receiving objective news and information about the war in Ukraine. As a result, some critics are already blasting Cogent, saying the decision could backfire.
“Cutting Russians off from internet access cuts them from off from sources of independent news and the ability to organize anti-war protests. Don't do Putin's dirty work for him,” tweeted Eva Galperin, director of cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
On the same day, the Kremlin also began blocking access to Facebook, cutting Russian users off from another source information about the invasion in Ukraine.