Access to Apple’s official website and the App Store in Russia fell sharply late last week, the independent Russian news outlet Verstka reported.
According to OONI, the international research project, anomalous connections to Apple resources began rising on Thursday, July 16. Over the following days, availability of the website fell to roughly 30–40%. For the App Store, that figure stands at around 60%. No similar problems have been observed in other countries.
Data from the Sboy.rf service corroborate those findings. Its graph shows users reporting App Store outages en masse since July 16, with comments placing the disruptions across multiple regions of Russia.
Availability of the Google Play store in Russia currently stands at around 40–50%. OONI’s graphs, however, show a large number of anomalous connections to that platform stretching back several months.
The disruptions may indicate that Russian authorities have partially restricted the App Store, Verstka wrote. Roskomnadzor’s press service stated as early as July 14, in a comment to the Russian news agency Interfax, that it was not restricting access to Apple or Google services.
In early June, Apple removed the Russian messenger app Max from the App Store. The company cited international sanctions as the reason for its decision, without specifying which ones. A few weeks later, other apps belonging to the VK holding company disappeared from Apple’s digital store as well.
On July 13, the European Union imposed sanctions against VK and its subsidiary Communications Platform, which developed the Max messenger. A few days later, Google also removed the holding company’s apps from its store.
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