We are talking about nthLink, Psiphon and Lantern services. The increase in funding is associated with the recent increase in the activity of Russian users due to mass blocking of websites, media and social networks in Russia.

VPN for Russians

• According to the head of the US Federal Media Agency, through which money flowed, in May the number of Russian users of programs to circumvent censorship reached more than 4 million people.
• The source states that from 2015 to 2021, all three companies received a total of $4.8 million for development, and funding has nearly doubled since February of this year.
• VPN service providers have confirmed that they need to scale their systems due to the sharp increase in viewers. Thus, nthLink reported that from the first days after the launch of advertising its services, the number of users from Russia increased from 1 to 50 thousand users per day. Psiphon said more than 1.3 million users use the service every day. Lantern has reported 1.5 million new registrations since the beginning of March.
• In total, Russia’s audience has grown by 452 percent as the local dictatorship has blocked Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, many foreign and Russian media outlets, and numerous foreign websites.

What do they say in Russia?

In response to a note from Reuters, the State Duma confirmed that US authorities’ VPN sponsorship Part of the information struggle against Russia.

We consider this as one of the forms of struggle in the commission. VPN and browsing on the Internet – bullet-to-armor dispute, bullet-to-armor battle. I periodically communicate with representatives of Roskomnadzor, and it seems to me that they understand the whole threat and are doing everything technically possible. But not everything is due to the fact that the offensive technique is always ahead of the defensive technique.
– LDPR deputy, deputy head of the profile commission Andrey Lugovy explained.

According to Lugovoi, a significant part of VPN services are blocked by special devices on communication lines, while the other part is blocked by Roskomnadzor. At the same time, they state that the fight against VPN services needs to be strengthened and made more effective.