In January 2026, the former head of British intelligence MI6, Richard Dearlove, in an interview with The Sun, openly stated that Putin “certainly” uses doubles for security reasons.
He also emphasized “reliable” reports from Ukrainian intelligence services that it is the doubles of the Russian president who can appear in public.
Why Putin might use doubles
According to Dearlove, for a leader of this level, the use of doubles is almost a standard element of protection, especially after the outbreak of a full-scale war against Ukraine, when the risks to the Kremlin’s security have increased significantly.
“Kyiv has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to strike deep inside Russian territory, heightening concerns in the Kremlin about Putin's vulnerability, especially in the open or in weakly controlled environments,” The Sun said.
The former head of MI6 believes that doubles can be used when traveling to public events, appearing in public places or in situations where it is impossible to fully control the situation.
At the same time, he is convinced that doubles are unlikely to be suitable for personal diplomatic meetings or negotiations, because it is too difficult to reliably reproduce a person at close range.
What did Ukrainian intelligence say about Putin's doubles?
Nobody names the exact number of probable Putin doubles. At the same time, Ukrainian intelligence services have repeatedly stated the likely existence of at least three Putin doubles.
According to intelligence, people with a similar physique, demeanor, gait, facial expressions and facial features could have been specially trained for this purpose.
Back in 2022, the then head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, Kirill Budanov, stated that during the rare public appearances of the Russian leader, significant differences could be noticed.
If you compare Putin, who was “showed” from 1999 to 2010 (although even then, according to the Ukrainian intelligence officer, doubles were sometimes “working”), and the modern one, you can be convinced that these are different people, Budanov argued.
He also stated that information about the Russian President’s health problems may indicate that Putin has doubles. This may stem from differences that can be observed during the Russian leader's various public appearances.
“They have different habits, different manners, different gaits, sometimes even different heights, if you look closely,” the scout noted.
In addition to behavioral nuances, there are differences in appearance.
“The picture, let’s say, of the ear is different. And this is like a fingerprint, each person’s picture of the ear is unique. It cannot be repeated,” Budanov emphasized.
That is why assumptions about the so-called collective Putin have repeatedly appeared in the media and social networks, when the President of the Russian Federation can allegedly be replaced by stand-ins at various events.
They were even given unofficial nicknames – in particular, “bunker”, “talker” or “Crimea”. At the same time, there is no confirmed information about the identities of possible doubles in the public domain, the media wrote.
“Who today plays the role of a conditional Putin is an absolutely open question,” said the head of Ukrainian military intelligence.
What the AI analysis showed
In 2023, the Japanese TV channel TBS conducted a study using artificial intelligence technologies, according to The Sun.
Experts compared Putin's face and movements during various public events. The results sparked a new wave of discussion.
The analysis showed that the Putin who inspected the Crimean Bridge a few months earlier may not be the same Putin who attended the annual parade on Red Square in 2023. According to the study, the agreement between them was only 53%.
The dictator's trip to Mariupol gave an even lower figure – 40%, and individual photos from Crimea showed only 18% similarity.
The study's conclusions stated “a high probability of the existence of at least two twins.”
What Russian independent media wrote
The topic of possible isolation and use of doubles by Vladimir Putin was publicly raised in 2023 even by Russian independent media. The British publication The Sun wrote about this with reference to an investigation by the Russian media “Proekt.”, the material of which has now been removed from the network.
According to journalists, 521 “public” meetings of Putin were analyzed over the year. The investigation stated that:
- Putin held more than 113 meetings via video conference;
- in 43% of cases (224 meetings) he kept his distance from his interlocutors;
- only in 36% of meetings was he present in person without distancing – after preliminary quarantine for participants;
- in total, in 2023, Putin appeared in public for only 147 days.
The material noted that some of the meetings could be converted into video format to conceal the state of health of the Russian president and the possible use of doubles.
How dictators used doubles
Former adviser to the Office of the President of Ukraine and military officer Viktor Andrusiv confirmed in an interview with The Sun that this practice fits well into the Russian political tradition.
He recalled that back in Soviet times, Joseph Stalin used the services of a double – actor and illusionist Felix Dadaev. Despite the significant difference in age, Dadaev was specially taught to copy the voice, movements and behavior of the Soviet dictator, and makeup was actively used to maximize the similarity.
The Kremlin traditionally rejects all statements about the possible existence of Putin's doubles and calls such assumptions “conspiracy theories.”
Putin himself also publicly denied using doubles. In February 2020, in an interview with the Russian TASS agency, he stated that in the early 2000s he was allegedly offered to hire a double for security reasons, but he refused.
According to him, the backup was supposed to replace him during trips to potentially dangerous places during the period of active fight against terrorism.
“I gave up doubles. This was during the most difficult times of the fight against terrorism,” Putin said.
