Amnezia Pulse launches live map to monitor Russian internet shutdowns in real time

What is Amnezia Pulse?

Amnezia VPN, a censorship‑resistant VPN provider, has opened its internal monitoring tool to the public under the name Amnezia Pulse. The service presents a live, colour‑coded map that shows internet outages, slowdowns and "whitelist" restrictions as they happen. The map is built from anonymised traffic data collected by Amnezia’s own VPN servers.

How the map works

The system continuously records the amount of inbound and outbound data and the number of active connections that pass through each server. For every Russian region and each of the six major providers monitored – the four mobile operators MTS, MegaFon, Beeline, T2 and the broadband providers Rostelecom and Dom.ru – Pulse creates a 14‑day baseline of "normal" activity, broken down into five‑minute intervals. An incident is flagged when several warning signs coincide, such as:

• a sustained drop in traffic lasting more than an hour,
• multiple operators showing a simultaneous decline, or
• several regions experiencing disruptions at the same time.

When an incident is detected, the map updates the region’s colour: green (no disruption), yellow (minor problems) or red (serious outage). Clicking a region reveals an hour‑by‑hour graph of the event.

Current findings in Russia

According to a Newsweek report cited by Amnezia, the map logged 80 incidents across 36 Russian regions between 15 September and 20 October 2026, with Krasnodar Krai experiencing the most severe outages. The provider also notes the emergence of synchronised shutdowns that affect several regions or operators simultaneously – a pattern that could indicate coordinated government action.

Beyond Russia: early signals elsewhere

While Russia is the primary focus, Amnezia Pulse has already identified traffic anomalies in Gabon, linked to prolonged social‑media restrictions. The company says it plans to extend coverage to additional African nations and to parts of Latin America, though no specific rollout dates have been announced.

Practical implications for everyday users

For a typical internet user, Pulse answers a simple but critical question: Is the problem on my end, or has the internet been cut? By providing a real‑time visual cue, the map can spare users the time‑consuming process of restarting routers, switching VPN apps, or troubleshooting local network hardware.

Benefits for researchers and rights groups

Amnezia intends to release an open API that will allow researchers, human‑rights organisations and technical experts to download the anonymised data for independent analysis. Maria Xynou of the censorship‑measurement project OONI described Pulse as "a valuable resource for both the Russian and global internet freedom communities."

Limitations and open questions

• User base dependency: Pulse’s accuracy hinges on the number of Amnezia Free and Premium users active in a given region. Sparse user density could lead to missed or delayed detections.
• Potential interference: The tool was temporarily paused earlier in 2026 after what Amnezia characterised as an attack by Russia’s media regulator Roskomnadzor. The company reports that it has since reinforced its apps against blocking, but the incident highlights the vulnerability of such monitoring systems to state pressure.
• Scope of data: The map only reflects traffic that passes through Amnezia’s servers. Outages that affect users who do not employ Amnezia VPN may go unrecorded.

How to verify the information

All of the details above are drawn from Amnezia’s public announcement and the accompanying TechRadar article. Readers can view the live map directly at the Amnezia Pulse website (link provided in the source) and compare the displayed incidents with the timeline reported by Newsweek. For deeper technical insight, the forthcoming open API will allow independent verification of the anonymised traffic metrics.

Source: [TechRadar – Amnezia launches ‘Amnezia Pulse’ – a live map that tracks internet shutdowns as they happen](https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-services/amnezia-launches-amnezia-pulse-a-live-map-that-tracks-internet-shutdowns-as-they-happen)