Putin's social media ban cost Russia's economy more than $4 billion last year

• Russia lost over $4 billion last year from internet disruptions, a new report says.
• Those losses are partly fueled by Russia's aggressive bans on Western social media sites.
• Moscow's economy faces numerous challenges as war continues to drag on in Ukraine.

Putin's social media ban was partly responsible for costing the Russian economy billions of dollars in 2023, a new report says.

Russia began limiting access to Western social media platforms like Facebook and X in the weeks after it began its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.