Yesterday, Chess.com was banned by the Russian government agency Roscomnadzor, the “Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media.” Roscomnadzor is responsible for censorship within Russia, a busy occupation these days. Since the start of Russia’s war against Ukraine on February 24th, Roscomnadzor has banned hundreds of sites including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google News, BBC News, NPR, and Amnesty International.

According to Roscomnadzor, their goal is to block two webpages: “On The Invasion of Ukraine” which outlines our policy and actions regarding the war on Ukraine and addresses FAQ and “Ukrainian Chess Players In Times Of War” which is a piece interviewing Ukrainian chess players on their circumstances and views during the early days of the war. Since Chess.com uses secure https webpages, Roscomnadzor is unable to ban these single pages and has banned the entire Chess.com site. Our members report that Chess.com’s apps are unaffected. We happily encourage our Russian members to continue accessing our site using our apps or any of the many outstanding VPN services that are so essential in Russia.

We reaffirm our condemnation in the strongest possible terms of the Russian government’s war of aggression against Ukraine and will continue to publish content to that effect. We will continue to welcome Chess.com members from Russia who defy the government’s ban and play on Chess.com.