Russia's Blink app publicly slams VK while quietly feeding it user data
An investigation by Novaya Gazeta Europe journalists found that Russian location-sharing app Blink sends user data to VK servers even as it publicly attacks VK's Max messenger. Several senior Blink staff have ties to VK.
Russian location-tracking app Blink, which lets users monitor their friends' whereabouts, transmits user data to servers belonging to tech giant VK, according to an investigation by Novaya Gazeta Europe journalists. This comes despite Blink's public campaign against VK, particularly targeting the company's Max messaging app, and its public feud with VK design director Artemy Lebedev.
A public feud
In August 2026, Blink and bloggers apparently connected to the company sharply criticized Lebedev after he described Blink as an "anti-app" in which "everything is terrible, everything is monstrous." Blink staff have also mocked the Max app directly — in a video filmed at VK Fest, a Blink social media manager asks apparently random passersby which name they consider worst, and they all reply "Maksim." Standing in front of a MAX messenger booth, he concludes: "Never talk to Max. He's not your friend; we are."
Close personnel links to VK
Eight senior Blink employees, along with one of the company's former CEOs, either previously worked at VK before joining Blink or continue to work at VK.
Unencrypted data transfers
Blink continuously tracks users' movements and sends this data to multiple destinations, including VK's servers, without end-to-end encryption. Location data is sent every few seconds to MyTracker, an analytics platform owned by VK, making it possible to reconstruct a person's detailed route, speed and stops. Additionally, Blink Maps, the app's core mapping component, is hosted on VK's own servers, which the company does not otherwise rent out to third parties.
