There is an author on Quora called Dima Vorobyev who used to work as a propaganda executive during the Soviet times. After the fall of the Soviet Union, he went into marketing.

Vorobyev is a brilliant writer whose thesis is that the Russian civilization is a European project of colonization and extraction of the Eurasian continent. For as long as Russia has existed, it has only properly functioned when ruled by a strong centralized state controlled by an elite. All other times have only seen chaos, deep insecurity and hunger. This view of Russia explains the paradox that rulers like Stalin are so popular in Russia despite the fact that Stalin killed more Russians than Hitler.

Stability and the absence of total lawlessness and constant drive-by shootings in the middle of the day like in the 1990's but without a concentration camp system in place is something that, historically speaking, Russians should be happy for. In that sense, particularly the high oil price fueled bonanza of 2000-2014 when Russians enjoyed stability and a constantly rising standard of living under president Putin was an exceptionally good period in Russian history. Now that the standard of living is no longer rising, there seems to be growing resentment in the population. The government is doing what it can to try and quell all resistance. Putin is a former spy. He's going to use the most subtly effective and carefully calculated measures he can. The crackdown on crypto is part of that.