Makhachkala residents talk about difficulties when connecting to free Wi-Fi hotspots

Mobile internet outages in Makhachkala continued today, while the public access point on Lenin Square has an extremely limited range, city residents said. They complained about difficulties with calling a taxi, buying tickets, and making calls.

As reported by "Kavkazsky Uzel", due to mobile internet outages, it is impossible to call a taxi or pay by card, residents of
Makhachkala and Kaspiysk complained. The republic's authorities called this a temporary measure in connection with the possible threat of a UAV flying over the territory of Dagestan. The Minister of Digital Development of Dagestan, Yuri Gamzatov, reported that the authorities are working to expand the network of public Wi-Fi hotspots in all public areas of the cities of Makhachkala and Kaspiysk: in parks and squares, shopping and entertainment centers, stores and branches of the MFC, noting that the first such points have already appeared on the central square of Makhachkala.

In Makhachkala, mobile Internet only started working late in the evening of August 12, Arsen told a correspondent of the "Caucasian Knot". Today, August, the problems with the Internet resumed, he said.

"It was impossible to call a taxi in the Yandex app. We tried through a local taxi company, where you can order by phone. They said the wait time would be at least 20 minutes, and it was not a fact that there would be a free driver," said Indira.

"Guests came to visit us, they wanted, as usual, to order food through the app on the phone, but they could not connect. For some reason, the Internet via Wi-Fi in the house
also worked intermittently," says Nabi.

"We urgently needed to go to Moscow because a relative was sick. We could not order plane tickets, the app did not work. We barely found a cash desk in Makhachkala that sold “paper” tickets, we were late, there were none for that date,” said Marat.

“My wife and I came to the store, we didn’t have any cash with us. The bank’s app didn’t work to pay for the purchase. It’s good that the store was nearby, we agreed that we would bring the cash later,” says Ramiz.

Makhachkala resident Murad tried to connect to the public network in the central square of Makhachkala. "Mobile Internet was not available. Only near the Makhachkala administration did the "Lenin Square" network appear. It was difficult to connect, unless you went close to the steps of the entrance to the mayor's office. Then they asked for a phone number and other personal data. Why should I give this in an incomprehensible public network? They promised just a public point. Should people be able to get Internet at the steps of the mayor's office? If a person is in the city and needs to urgently contact relatives, should he run to the point announced by the Ministry of Digital Development of Dagestan? And no one named these locations," said Murad.

Makhachkala resident Abduragim said that the city authorities did not create, as promised, free Internet access points in public areas. "Shopping centers, stores, and other organizations have their own Wi-Fi networks. Thank you, we went to a pharmacy today, they gave us the password, we were able to talk to our child who was home alone. Before that, there was no connection, we were worried. Many stores and cafes, given the situation, allow you to connect to their Wi-Fi networks. But this is their merit, and not the Dagestan authorities', as we were promised," the man says.

Note that Roskomnadzor announced today that calls via Telegram and WhatsApp* are being restricted.

"According to law enforcement agencies and numerous requests from citizens, foreign messengers Telegram and WhatsApp have become the main voice services used to deceive and extort money, and to involve Russian citizens in sabotage and terrorist activities," the agency said.

Recall that on March 8, the Minister of Digital Development of Dagestan, Yuri Gamzatov, announced that the Telegram messenger was blocked and does not work in Dagestan and Chechnya. According to him, the decision to do so was made at the federal level at the suggestion of law enforcement agencies, since Telegram is often used by enemies, an example of which is the riots at the Makhachkala airport [in October 2023]. The authorities acknowledged blocking the messenger only in March, although by that time access to Telegram had been absent for several months, local residents said. The temporary unblocking of Telegram in Dagestan on May 26 and 27, during the visit to the republic of the official representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova, affected only some of the messenger's users in the republic, and from May 28, access to the messenger from Dagestan was againclosed.  

* the activities of the Meta company (which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp) are banned in Russia.