Russia has arsenal of technologies to track citizens' online lives - NYT

That's according to The New York Times, which cited its own informed sources, Ukrinform reports.

"The technologies have given the police and Russia’s Federal Security Service, better known as the F.S.B., access to a buffet of snooping capabilities focused on the day-to-day use of phones and websites," the report says.

The developed tools allow the FSB to track certain types of activity in encrypted programs, such as WhatsApp and Signal, monitor phone locations, identify anonymous social media users, and penetrate people's accounts.

All of this information came from documents from Russian video surveillance providers obtained by the publication, security experts, digital activists, and a person associated with digital surveillance operations in Russia.

It is noted that many of the tech firms developing surveillance tools are owned by Citadel Group, which was previously partially controlled by Alisher Usmanov, who is subject to EU sanctions as one of Putin's "favorite oligarchs."

Some of the companies are trying to go abroad, which increases the risks of Russian tracking technologies going international.

One of MFI Soft's tools - NetBeholder, helps to determine the location of two phones and predict a potential meeting of subscribers. The system can determine whether a person uses multiple mobile devices, the place of origin of citizens, or the country of origin of foreigners.

And the Protei system is used to transcribe voice during interception of phone calls to identify a "suspicious person".

As Ukrinform reported, Russian hackers may launch a cyberattack on Canada's oil and gas sector, given its active support for Ukraine.