By Murad Rakhimov | 2026-01-27

Every taxi ride, food delivery and email search on Yandex now carries a growing chance of ending up in a government file.

Once known primarily as a Russian-language search engine and email service, Yandex has evolved into a sprawling technology ecosystem. Its products now include a web browser, video streaming, cloud storage, a marketplace, car-sharing and delivery services, AI-powered tools and voice assistants. As the company expanded into services that track users' movements and daily habits, the state gained new avenues to access personal data.

In the first half of 2025, Russia's most popular internet platform complied with a record number of official requests for users' personal data, according to the company's transparency report analyzed by journalists at Verstka.

Record disclosures

Between January and June 2025, Russian authorities sent Yandex 53,994 requests for user data, a 48% increase year over year. The company satisfied more requests than ever before. Data for the second half of the year has not yet been published.

As in previous years, officials most frequently sought information tied to Yandex's mobility and logistics services. Authorities showed particular interest in taxi passengers and users of courier, car-sharing and scooter-rental platforms. Requests for data on Yandex Mail users also rose. Authorities submitted 2,486 such requests, and Yandex fulfilled 63% of them.

Government demand for geolocation data grew especially fast. These requests include users' searches for specific locations, their whereabouts and potential movements. In the first half of 2023, Yandex received 252 such requests and complied with 188, or 75%. In the first half of 2025, the number jumped to 1,109 requests, with an approval rate of 89%.

Yandex also processed 13,397 requests under Russia's "right to be forgotten" law during the same period. The law requires search engines to remove links to information users consider illegal, inaccurate or outdated. Experts and internet companies sharply criticized the legislation even at the draft stage. Yandex complied with 73% of these takedown requests.

Surveillance by design

After Yandex.Taxi began sharing information with security agencies, Yandex.Delivery followed. Before Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine, the delivery service handled more than 50 million orders a year.

On February 2, 2024, regulators added Yandex.Delivery to the ORI register, a list of "information distributors." Authorities also added Kinopoisk and Yandex.Drive, the company's car-sharing service, which at the time operated a fleet of more than 16,000 vehicles.

Companies listed in the ORI register must store extensive user data, including actions, purchases, correspondence and audio and video calls. Upon request, they must hand this data over to the Federal Security Service, or FSB. Nearly 400 services now appear on the registry, including social network VK, online banks Sber and Tinkoff, the website Pikabu, dating platforms and email providers.

In January 2024, the Ministry of Digital Development proposed expanding the registry to include any website or service that supports correspondence or user feedback. Under the proposal, Roskomnadzor would be able to compel companies to join if they refuse to register voluntarily.

Alisher Ilkhamov, director of Central Asia Due Diligence in London, said wartime conditions push states to strengthen their ability to detect sabotage and subversive activity. He pointed to Ukrainian operations against Russian military figures on Russian territory as an example.

"Russian investigators need access to taxi databases to, for example, identify people who were at the scene of sabotage and what routes they used," Ilkhamov told Kontur.

At the same time, he argued that surveillance now extends far beyond narrowly defined security needs. These measures reflect a broader transformation as authorities seek to maintain control amid military setbacks and economic strain.

"This is done to identify those who disagree with government policies as well as potential dissidents," Ilkhamov said.

Privacy as illusion

Dmitry Dubrovsky, a social scientist at Charles University in Prague, said Yandex stopped being a safe platform for users years ago and that privacy on the service is largely illusory.

"The intelligence services have controlled Yandex for quite some time," Dubrovsky told Kontur, adding that growing pressure from security agencies contributed to investor withdrawals and internal splits, alongside the impact of the war.

Dubrovsky said the Kremlin's model of "digital authoritarianism" relies on convenience as a tool of control. Authorities promote mandatory apps, messaging services and popular platforms that double as data-collection mechanisms. He cited efforts to link the Gosuslugi e-government portal with the Max messenger app as an example.

Many Russians underestimate how accessible their personal data has become, Dubrovsky noted. Ordinary users often assume they attract no interest from security agencies and discount the consequences of routine monitoring. In reality, expanded access increasingly affects daily life, from correspondence to movement tracking through taxi data.

Russia is still far from total digital control, Dubrovsky argued, citing technical and political constraints. But monitoring citizens' communications, moods and movements has become far easier than in the past.

"What was difficult in the past is now quite easy," he said.

Alexander Kim, a Russian blogger and human rights activist, said Verstka's analysis shows that digital surveillance continues to intensify, though motives behind specific data requests vary. Access to taxi and delivery data allows authorities to link individuals to home addresses and habitual locations.

"But the question is likely something else: in each case of a data request, what exactly about the specific person aroused the state’s interest?" Kim told Kontur. "There is no ready answer here."

Kim said it has long been meaningless to speak of privacy in Russia's internet sector, a reality reflected in the widespread use of VPNs and anonymization tools such as Tor.

"Many people have long perceived every Russian email service like Mail.ru or Yandex, as well as Russian social networks like VK, as divisions of the FSB," Kim said.