VPN apps are super popular in Russia right now, for obvious reasons

I'm sure by now we all know what's going on between Russia and Ukraine, with Russians being shut out from the developed world... and now, VPN downloads are skyrocketing in the country. Duh.

Russians are jumping all over the world of VPNs (Virtual Private Network) because the outside world is getting harder to access, with the likes of Facebook, Twitter, and everything in between now offline to Russian citizens on the internet. But with new numbers from AppFigures, VPN downloads in Russia have absolutely exploded -- by a huge 1200% -- on the Apple App Store and Google Play Stores.

The use of a VPN allows Russians who are banned from the internet, letting them bypass the blocks that the world is putting up around them. The thing is, how much longer can those people download VPN apps from the App Store and Play Store... if those stores were to go offline in the coming days. Hell, it could happen at any moment. Apple and Google could bring down the App Gauntlet, taking down both app platforms and taking down VPNs with it.

Before the attack on Ukraine on February 24, there were around 10,000 downloads of VPN apps across both the app stores -- but man, they really did ramp up on March 1 alone -- with close to 500,000 downloads of VPN apps in the 24-hour period.