The Bank of Russia halted voting on the image for the new 500-ruble banknote after a scandal involving the two frontrunners: Mount Elbrus and the Grozny City skyscraper complex. The regulator said it could not determine the winner objectively and therefore refused to finalize the contest results.
The vote began on October 1 and was supposed to end on October 14. Russians were asked to choose symbols of the North Caucasus Federal District for the redesigned banknote. By the time the vote was canceled, according to the report, Elbrus had received about 1.225 million votes, while Grozny City had 1.064 million.
The campaign quickly turned into more than an ordinary public contest. Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov urged people to vote for Grozny City and announced a giveaway of 10 iPhone 17 devices for participants. He was backed by Chechen officials and bloggers, and blogger Askhab Tamaev promised a car as a prize. State Duma deputy Vladislav Davankov campaigned for Elbrus and offered a chance to win a trip to a sanatorium; pro-war Z-bloggers also joined that effort.
Supporters of Elbrus argued that once alternative authorization methods were removed, large-scale manipulation became impossible and the mountain’s lead became obvious. Chechen officials, by contrast, said votes for Grozny City had disappeared and demanded an explanation for the “legal and technical nature” of those changes.
At first, people could vote through Gosuslugi, VK, Odnoklassniki, and email, and multiple votes were allowed. After mutual accusations of manipulation, the Central Bank on October 12 left only Gosuslugi authorization in place. After that, the dynamics changed sharply: Grozny City’s total fell, while Elbrus surged, at times by about 20,000 votes per hour.
The Botnadzor project said bots were actively involved in online discussion of the vote: over 12 days, by its count, 227 fake accounts posted 394 comments under 65 posts. The Central Bank has said a new vote will be launched later. The updated 500-ruble note is expected in the second half of 2026, and Deputy Central Bank Chairman Sergey Belov said it will enter circulation no earlier than 2027.