I've been going deep on internet censorship circumvention for authoritarian countries.
the uncomfortable thing I learned: VPNs are mostly a marketing story at this point. centralized servers, known traffic fingerprints, and a business model that can't survive a government with patience and DPI infrastructure


Mediazona
Behind the curtain. A comprehensive guide to Russia’s internet censorship in 2026—and what life feels like inside it
Shutdowns, blocks, surveillance, and a messenger nobody trusts: how Russia’s internet censorship machine works today

