Russia Blocks OONI Explorer, a Large Open Dataset On Internet Censorship

Russia has blocked access to OONI Explorer, a platform providing data on global internet censorship, due to concerns over circumvention tools. This block affects Russian users' ability to access not only circumvention data but also the extensive dataset on internet censorship. OONI Explorer is one of the largest open datasets on internet censorship worldwide, launched in 2016 to enable researchers to investigate internet censorship. The platform publishes new measurements from around the world in real-time, contributed by OONI Probe users worldwide. Since 2012, OONI Explorer has collected over 2 billion network measurements from 27 thousand distinct networks in 242 countries and territories. OONI Probe users in Russia contribute the second largest volume of measurements, after the US. This data has enabled the study of various cases of internet censorship in Russia, including the blocking of Tor and independent news media websites. The data has also shown changes in internet censorship in Russia amid the war in Ukraine. A report has been released sharing OONI data on the blocking of OONI Explorer in Russia. The block is significant as it restricts access to valuable data on internet censorship in Russia and worldwide.