Russia to expand ‘cyber squads’ in schools and universities to monitor online content

Russia plans to expand cyber squads and media patrols in secondary and higher educational institutions. The provision is part of a government package of measures to counter what it calls “negative social phenomena among children and young people” for 2026–2030.

The package includes measures to identify minors plotting unlawful acts intended to destabilize public order, with information about them to be passed to the Interior Ministry. It also calls for developing an interagency coordination mechanism to quickly restrict the spread, in regional media and popular social media communities, of materials describing armed attacks on educational institutions and scenes of violence and cruelty involving minors, as well as preventive talks with students at general education and vocational institutions about criminal and administrative liability for extremism- and terrorism-related offenses.

Also listed under the prevention of “negative social phenomena among children and young people” are events marking World Anti-Drug Day under the slogan “The Incentive of Your Dream Is You Yourself!”; the organization and staging of the “heroic-patriotic” project “From Oblivion into Immortality!”; and the All-Russian project “Dialogue with Heroes,” whose implementing agencies include the Education Ministry, Russia’s Defense Ministry, the Interior Ministry, the Russian National Guard, and the Investigative Committee.

Rosmolodezh, commenting on the package, said “cyber squads and media patrols” in their current form have existed since 2023. The agency described them as “voluntary youth associations based at schools, vocational schools, colleges, and universities” that monitor online publications for “materials aimed at drawing the younger generation into activities that threaten their lives and health” and refer the content to the relevant agencies for blocking.