Russia forces Apple to remove dozens of VPN apps from App Store

Apple has removed 25 virtual private network (VPN) apps from the Russian App Store at the request of Roskomnadzor, Russia's telecommunications watchdog.

Roskomnadzor confirmed to Interfax that the order targets multiple apps (including NordVPN, Proton VPN, Red Shield VPN, Planet VPN, Hidemy.Name VPN, Le VPN, and PIA VPN) used to gain access to content tagged as illegal in Russia.

"We are writing to notify you that your application, per demand from Roskomnadzor will be removed from the Russia App Store because it includes content that is illegal in Russia, which is not in compliance with the App Review Guidelines," Apple said in emails sent to some of the affected VPN vendors.

"If you need additional information regarding this removal or the laws and requirements in Russia, we encourage you to reach out directly to Roskomnadzor. While your app has been removed from the Russia App Store, it is still available in the App Stores for the other territories you selected in App Store Connect."

Red Shield VPN and LeVPN, two of the companies that had their apps removed, confirmed that Apple emailed about the ban and advised them to contact Roskomnadzor for more details.

"Red Shield VPN has been subject to blocking attempts by Russian authorities since 2018. We challenged the blocking in Russian courts, and, as expected, lost in all instances. Subsequently, we filed a claim with the ECHR, which is still under consideration," Red Shield said.

"Since then, over the past six years, Russian authorities have blocked thousands of Red Shield VPN nodes but have been unable to prevent Russian users from accessing them. Apple, however, has done this job much more effectively for them."

While the Russian telecom watchdog has been increasingly targeting VPN applications since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, this is part of a broader and older effort to block access to such services.

Even though Putin signed a bill banning VPNs, proxies, and Tor into law in July 2017, the Russian authorities didn't try to enforce it until March 2019, when the Roskomnadzor notified ten VPN providers that they were required to connect their systems to the Russian State Information System (FGIS), which would ensure that users would be prevented from accessing blocked websites automatically.

At the time, out of all those notified (i.e., NordVPN, HideMyAss!, Hola VPN, OpenVPN, VyprVPN, ExpressVPN, TorGuard, IPVanish, VPN Unlimited, and Kaspersky Secure Connection), Kaspersky was the only vendor to connect its systems to Russia's FGIS.

Almost a year later, in January 2020, Roskomnadzor also blocked the ProtonVPN and ProtonMail email services, saying cyber criminals used them to send bomb threats.

Russia also banned Opera VPN and VyprVPN in June 2021 and six more VPN services (Betternet, Lantern, X-VPN, Cloudflare WARP, Tachyon VPN, and PrivateTunnel) in December 2021 after classifying them as threats.