Russian here. First, it might seem to you that powers that be can simply fabricate whatever data they want, but this is not the case. The elections are presented as democratic, they are monitored to some extent, and this year monitoring was more efficient than in any previous elections, so fraud is non-trivial. The most typical method is ballot stuffing and it is detectable using statistical methods.

Second, you're overestimating the "political machine". There was no properly designed fraud with some super-intelligent planning at the top. It would require proper coordination and commitment on all levels, not to mention some real skill, while in a corrupt government lower levels always try to reap whatever they can for themselves, while pulling the wool over eyes of upper levels. That's how the whole thing eventually falls apart. What upper levels care most about? Local election results. So the lower levels clumsily try to fabricate them.

The fraud wasn't even that blatant. By different estimates, only 1/3 to 1/5 of the votes United Russia got were fraudulent.

Now, you see, while material goods are constantly produced, consumed and destroyed in this society in necessary quantities, having limited use and limited lifetime, useful information is not destroyed. Accumulating information forms certain concepts called "culture" and "science", and this process is called "progress of human civilization". Everything we do is based on ever-growing heap of information, and if the cost of using this information grows together with the size of the heap, our progress will eventually grind to a halt. However, appropriate compensation for creation of this information is necessary to stimulate production of this information, so some middle ground must be found here. Middle ground, and not perpetual government enforcement of some weird god-given right you say you have.

You could say "don't buy my book if you don't agree with my license", but the government could as well just say "don't distribute this book if you don't agree with my copyright enforcement rules". And if not for government there would be no protection.

If you compare the average bandwidth of a youtube video with the average bandwidth of a voice call, you will understand that's rather unlikely.

A phone number identifies a phone, not a person.

A postal address identifies the location of a building, not a person.