Russia would have to ban electricity to isolate the Russian Internet, says ICANN VP

Amid concerns in Moscow that Russian Internet users face the threat of isolation from the World Wide Web, a prominent Internet authority is arguing that nothing short of banning electricity could rob Russians of their access to global cyberspace.

According to Mikhail Yakushev, a regional vice president at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, which maintains the Web’s global domain name system, cutting off Russia from the Internet would be technologically possible only through “the destruction of every Russian power station, without exception, and criminally prosecuting anyone who still wants to use electricity.”