If you notice a lot less Russian players on your favorite online poker site in the coming days, you have Vladimir Putin to thank.

On Wednesday, amendments to Russia’s federal law “On Information, Information Technologies and Information Protection” take effect, with new restrictions on the use of virtual private network (VPN) services and other ‘anonymizing’ tools that many Russians use to access online information their government doesn’t want them to see.

Russian legislators approved the anti-VPN legislation this summer and Putin eagerly signed it into law at the end of July. Companies that provide VPN and anonymizing tools and services can now find themselves out of business if they fail to ensure their products aren’t being used to access forbidden online fruit.

The Roskomnadzor telecommunications watchdog has been meeting with local internet service providers to ensure they toe the line, and announced on Tuesday that its experts were working with companies including Russian cybersecurity firm Kapersky Lab, search engines Mail.ru and Yandex, as well as the makers of the Opera browser (which features built-in VPN technology), to test “the new interaction system.”