Russia has begun blocking the largest video game websites
In Russia, widespread outages and reduced availability of the world’s largest gaming platforms, stores, and online games have begun to be reported, most likely as a result of interference by Russian regulators.
This is reported by "Verstka."
The service disruptions have affected popular services such as Steam, Xbox, PlayStation, Epic Games, Origin, as well as the browser game portal Pogo from the American company Electronic Arts. In addition, there has been a sharp increase in network anomalies when attempting to launch popular multiplayer online games such as Rift, Guild Wars, and RuneScape. This is reported by Verstka, citing monitoring results from OONI, a global service that tracks internet blockages.
According to the published data, the availability of the Steam platform in Russia has decreased by approximately 5%, Xbox console services by 9%, the Epic Games store by over 10%, and the Origin platform by nearly 11%. The most critical situation is currently observed with connections to the servers of the game Rift, where the rate of technical anomalies jumped from 4% to 50%, while the availability of Guild Wars dropped by 30%. Researchers note that the deterioration in connectivity to gaming resources began in February 2026, with no similar network issues reported in other countries around the world.
Analysts at RKS Global are convinced that the disruptions are the result of targeted actions by Russian regulators. Experts have suggested that some of the websites may have been subject to sanctions due to the placement of betting or other gambling advertisements. However, since no corresponding surge in new site-blocking decisions was found in public official registries, experts speculate that Russian authorities are using technical means of countering threats (TSPU). These hardware-software complexes are installed on telecommunications operators’ networks and allow for deep filtering and covert throttling of internet traffic without adding resources to public blocklists.
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