SSU of Ukraine: The Kremlin centralizes control over students through education and media

This was reported by the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine.

«The key tools are state funding, media assets, and educational platforms controlled by structures close to the president», the report states.

The main supplier of school textbooks in Russia is the publishing house «Prosveshcheniye», which is controlled by the «Fin-Partner» fund, associated with Russian oligarchs Boris and Arkady Rotenberg, long-time allies of Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin.

The state corporation «Rostec», headed by Sergey Chemezov, oversees the development of projects for scientific and technical clubs and competitions that involve tens of thousands of schoolchildren across the country.

Media consumption is largely controlled by structures of Yuriy Kovalchuk. His assets include the «National Media Group», «Gazprom-Media», and VK - the owner of the new messenger Max, which is actively promoted among the youth.

In 2025, the Russian government plans to spend 66 billion rubles on patriotic education programs. Of this, 20 billion is for funding the movement «Dzvijeniye Pervykh», which equals the annual budget of the Jewish Autonomous Region, where the level of housing gasification does not exceed 30%.

Simultaneously, the Russian Ministry of Digital Development plans a large-scale expansion of the video surveillance system.

By 2030, an additional 5 million cameras with facial recognition features are to be installed across Russian regions.

The total project budget is 12 billion rubles.

To date, more than 68 Federal subjects have already integrated the technology, and the number of active cameras has exceeded 1 million units.