Russia planning to disconnect from the Global Internet

Russia is contemplating on disconnecting from the global internet briefly, as part of a test of its cyber-defences.

The test will mean data passing between Russian citizens and organisations stays inside the nation rather than being routed internationally.

A draft law mandating technical changes mainly on needs to operate independently was presented to its parliament last year.

The draft law, named the Digital Economy National Program, requires Russia's ISPs to ensure that it can function in the event of foreign powers acting to segregate the country online.

The procedures outlined in the law include Russia creating its own version of the net's address system, known as DNS, so it can operate if links to these internationally-located servers are cut.

The test is estimated to happen before 1st of April but no exact date has been set.

NATO and its allies have threatened to sanction Russia over the cyber-attacks and other online interference which it is regularly accused of instigating.

As it stands, 12 organisations supervise the root servers for DNS and none of them are in Russia. Though many copies of the net's core address book do already exist inside Russia signifying its net systems could keep functioning even if penal action was taken to disconnect it.

The proposed test is also expected to involve ISPs demonstrating that they can direct data to government-controlled routing points. These will filter traffic so that data sent between Russians reaches its destination, but any destined for foreign computers is discarded.

Ultimately, the Russian government wants all domestic traffic to pass through these routing points. This is believed to be part of an effort to set up a mass censorship system akin to that seen in China, which tries to scrub out prohibited traffic.

China's firewall is possibly the world's best known censorship tool and it has become a refined operation. It also patrols its router points, using filters and blocks on keywords and certain websites and relaying web traffic so that computers cannot connect to sites the state does not wish Chinese citizens to view.

It is possible to get around some firewalls using virtual private networks (VPNs) which camouflages the location of a computer so the filters do not take effect, but some administrations are more tolerant of them than others. China cracks down on them from time to time and the penalty for providing or using illegal VPNs can be a prison sentence.

Russian news organisations reported that the nation's ISPs are largely supporting the aims of the draft law but are divided on how to do it. They believe the test will cause "major disruption" to Russian internet traffic, reports tech news website ZDNet.

The Putin led government is providing funds for ISPs to adjust their infrastructure so the redirection effort can be accurately tested.

Sometimes countries disconnect themselves by accident. A popular case is that of Mauritania that was left offline for two days in 2018 after the undersea fibre cable that supplied its internet was cut, possibly by a trawler. 

Source: Link