Smartphones in Ukraine are playing a crucial role, whether it’s checking up on loved ones, sending live videos to show the uncensored reality of what is happening in the country, or using GPS to help navigate a safe route out of the country.
Given this, some have expressed surprise that Russia hasn’t yet targeted base stations and other telecommunications infrastructure, with debate over whether this is an oversight or a deliberate ploy …
CNET reports that this war is different from any preceding one, in that the world is able to see live video footage of events as they happen.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine, the world has gotten a direct view of the war as ordinary Ukrainians document the fighting tearing through their country.
They’re not relying on sophisticated gear as they share videos and photos of the destruction and violence. Rather, they’re using the tools they’ve long relied on to communicate: smartphones, social media, messaging apps and a widespread telecommunications network that’s so far been spared from devastation.
Footage and information isn’t being blocked, so it’s flooding out of the country and into the world in a way that hasn’t happened at this scale […]
The overall effect is a daily flood of footage that’s exposed the world to tragedy and resolve in a way that can’t be done by official government statements or polished news reports. And this sets the Ukraine war apart from other recent conflicts, like the Armenian-Azerbaijan border strife, where much of the phone-recorded footage is taken by soldiers. In Ukraine, civilians are taking most of the videos, and forensic specialists say that little, if any, of the footage is doctored.
“We are not seeing much inauthentic or old video content in this conflict,” Benjamin Strick, director of investigations at the Centre for Information Resilience, told CNET over email. His organization is monitoring footage coming from Ukraine. “Much of the footage we are seeing actually comes from civilians filming on the ground. … We are seeing primarily footage filmed from balconies, outside of windows, dashcams, or just passersby on the street that are filming these events.”
The first thing people do after emerging from underground shelters is to use messaging apps to check on family and friends in other parts of the country. And those seeking to flee the conflict are using live maps to find a safe route.
Mobile phone services continue to operate, despite widespread destruction of buildings by the invading army. Some think that the failure to destroy telecommunications infrastructure is an oversight by Russia in what is increasingly looking like an ill-prepared attack. Others, however, suspect it’s a deliberate tactic so that Russian forces can suck up data in order to get a better picture of the situation.
However, the Ukrainian government says that in larger cities there has been more of a battle over connectivity. Alex Bornyakov, Ukrainian deputy minister of digital transformation, told CNET:
“Once they approached the big cities, they tried to cut [connectivity]. People instantly [started] repairing it.”
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