Microsoft was one of the first technology companies to joinin early March to take action against Russia in retaliation for its aggression against Ukraine. It first suspended its sales in the country, both in the professional and consumer segments, as well as in the gaming segment, and recently announced the dismissal of a large part of its workforce in Russia, which we can interpret as Redmond without thinking it. The conflict will not be resolved in a short time.

Over the months, yes, it seemed that Microsoft had already taken all the measures regarding access from Russia to its products and services, so it was a surprise to see that no, that they still saved at least one hit of effect, and which has also delivered without prior notice. And it is as we can read in Gizchina, Microsoft has blocked all its users from downloading Windows 10 and Windows 11 from Russia.

Since the entry into force of the blockade Russian users cannot download Windows ISO images, and downloading the Media Creation Tool is also disabled, a layout tool for custom Windows installations for later deployment. Now, when a user tries to download one of these resources from the Microsoft Web site, they receive a 404 (Page Not Found) error message that does not appear when trying to access from another geographic area.

Blockade, as confirmed by some media, in particular, they are not limited to some local internet access providers, which encourages us to think it was founded on Microsoft ‘s own network of servers. And measures of this type appear to be the most sensible, because probably if they received an application in this respect, Russian operators would prevent cooperation on this blockade.

However, we are talking about limited measures and surely you have been thinking about many ways that Russian citizens can bypass this blockade by Microsoft. From using VPNs to physical spoofing to using unofficial repositories and services peer to peerwe can assume that the scope of this measure by Microsoft will be somewhat limited.

However, it is equally true that companies cannot remain arms crossed in the face of this situation. I have no doubt that Microsoft is aware of the limited scope of this measure, but it is still another element that contributes to the international community’s demand that Russia give up its position once and for all.