Russia is bringing fewer cases over what people say in public and more over whom they once supported, funded or contacted. In the first nine months of 2026, the number of new defendants in cases restricting freedom of association rose by 50%, from 219 to 328, while prosecutions over public statements fell by 22%, from 487 to 380.
The change points to a harsher and less predictable form of political control. A post or speech can be dated and quoted. An alleged connection to a banned organisation can draw on old donation records, messages, contact lists and other traces gathered years earlier.
The figures were reported on 6 October by human rights monitors. They do not prove that every case was fabricated or that Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB, personally initiated each prosecution. They do show that cases involving prohibited organisations, extremism and state security now occupy a larger share of the machinery used against political activity.
The liability of an old connection
The sharpest increase concerned supporters of the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny. The number of people prosecuted in that category rose by 107%, from 69 to 143. Human rights monitors linked much of the rise to allegations that people financed extremism through donations to the Anti-Corruption Foundation, or FBK, which Russian authorities have designated as extremist. Forty new cases against FBK donors were recorded during the quarter.
Other categories rose sharply too. The number of people prosecuted as Jehovah’s Witnesses increased from 45 to 91. Cases involving supporters of the Citizens of the USSR movement rose from 13 to 29, while those involving supporters of Artpodgotovka increased from 20 to 44.
These groups have little in common politically or ideologically. Their shared feature in the cases is that they appear in proceedings involving organisations the Russian authorities have banned or labelled extremist. Once that designation exists, an earlier membership, payment, conversation or association can be examined in a new light.
That does not make every previous contact a crime. Its legal significance depends on the date, nature and evidence surrounding the conduct in each individual case. The wider mechanism, however, is straightforward: records created before a ban remain available after it and can later be used in an investigation shaped by the organisation’s new status.
For activists and ordinary supporters, the result is a longer period of exposure. A person may face prosecution not because of something said last week, but because investigators interpret an old relationship as part of an extremist or anti-state network. The practical boundary of political risk therefore extends well beyond current behaviour.
Security law takes the lead
The FSB’s growing presence can be seen in the legal categories used in these cases. According to the monitoring data, offences within the agency’s investigative remit appear in 67% of political prosecutions — roughly two in every three.
That figure does not mean the FSB carries out every procedural step. It does indicate that the service’s areas of responsibility increasingly shape the prosecution of political activity. In 2026, the number of new defendants accused of calls for extremism rose by 26%. Cases involving alleged calls for actions against state security increased by 13%.
Such provisions allow very different kinds of conduct to be placed inside the same security framework. A public statement, financial contribution or exchange with a banned group may be presented as part of a wider threat. Human rights monitors interpret the trend as evidence of a widening institutional role for the FSB in defining the limits of permissible political behaviour. That is an assessment of the pattern, not proof that the agency falsified evidence or opened every case to secure greater powers.
The fall in cases over individual internet posts is therefore not necessarily a sign of softer repression. It may reflect a change in what is most useful to prosecute. A post has a fixed date and wording. An alleged organisational connection can be assembled from several sources, linked to other people and tied to activities that took place long ago.
Cases involving terrorist organisations, terrorist communities or assistance to terrorist activity also increased by 25%, from 210 to 263 defendants. These are among the most serious accusations in Russia’s criminal justice system and can lead to lengthy prison sentences.
Occupied Ukrainian areas show the extreme version
The highest recorded rate of repression is in Ukrainian territories temporarily occupied by Russia. There, monitors recorded 9.1 cases per 100,000 residents, compared with 1.2 per 100,000 across Russia — more than seven times higher.
The comparison counts recorded cases, not the full extent of coercion. Population estimates in occupied areas are also difficult to establish reliably. Even with those limitations, the gap points to a distinct enforcement environment in which suspected disloyalty can more readily be converted into a criminal allegation.
The significance lies not only in the number of cases but in the standard being applied. When presumed loyalty becomes a security matter, the boundary between opposition, non-conformity and an offence depends increasingly on an investigator’s interpretation. That does not mean every method used in occupied areas will automatically spread across Russia. It does mean that practices developed under exceptional conditions may become normalised elsewhere.
For residents of other Russian regions, the concern is the potential expansion of a model in which suspicion itself carries greater legal weight. An old association, a financial record or a perceived relationship with a prohibited group can become the starting point for a serious investigation, even when the original activity is no longer current.
Long sentences replace short-term pressure
The number of political prisoners rose from 1,680 at the end of 2025 to 1,825 in October 2026, according to the monitors. The increase reflects a growing reliance on criminal imprisonment to remove activists from public life for years, rather than relying mainly on warnings, administrative penalties or brief detention.
Organisation-based prosecutions are particularly expansive because they can reach backwards. They can draw on existing registries, financial trails and communication records, then connect an individual to a broader alleged structure. For defendants, that makes the risks harder to anticipate: conduct that appeared minor or concluded years earlier may acquire new significance after a group is banned.
The pattern has been documented by The Insider, Memorial’s political repression monitor, Novaya Europe, The Insider’s Telegram channel and Agentsvo.
The unresolved question is whether this will remain a tool aimed at specific organisations already banned by the state or become a general method of policing political life. As long as old donations, contacts and membership records can be revived in security cases, the reach of repression will depend not only on what a person does now, but on what investigators can recover from the past.
