Where VPNs die: Iran and Russia block 10–15× more circumvention tools than anyone else

Rank every country by how many distinct anti-circumvention tools (VPNs, proxies, Tor services) it blocks NATIONALLY (confirmed across >=3 independent networks) and the distribution is a cliff, not a gradient: Iran 75, Russia 57 — then Saudi Arabia 5, China 4 (vastly under-counted), Indonesia 3, everyone else 0–2. Iran and Russia block roughly 10–15x more circumvention tools than any other measured country; only two states fight the anti-circumvention war at scale. The tool lists are the tell: Russia blocks amnezia.org (Amnezia, a VPN BUILT BY RUSSIAN developers to resist Russian censorship) and AdGuard VPN; Iran blocks 20speed.co (a domestic Iranian VPN) alongside AirVPN/HotspotShield/TunnelBear. Blocking the home-grown tool, not just foreign ones, is the signature of a state closing every exit. The data tracks the documented 2024–25 escalation: in Russia, Apple delisted ~60–100 VPN apps from its Russian App Store at Roskomnadzor's demand in 2024 (NordVPN, ExpressVPN, Proton, and Amnezia on 30 Oct 2024 'per demand from Roskomnadzor'), under a 2024 law outlawing non-compliant VPNs; in Iran, the Supreme Council for Cyberspace banned unlicensed VPNs in Feb 2024 and now blocks the circumvention PROTOCOLS themselves (Tor Snowflake, Reality, VMESS, VLESS). HONEST CAVEATS: counts are Citizen Lab ANON-tagged domains (a floor); China's 4 is a MEASUREMENT ARTIFACT (GFW=anomaly not confirmed) — its VPN blocking is among the most aggressive on earth, so read IR/RU as the high-confirmation leaders not the only aggressive censors; free-country entries (DE/NL/SE, 1–2) are single-network FPs on a shared anonymizer domain, not policy. Sources: TechRadar (Amnezia), Freedom House FOTN 2024 (Iran), Filterwatch, OONI circumvention tracker. Live: /v1/measurement/category-leaders?category=ANON.