I carefully followed the reaction to the situation with the “blocking” of Artemy Lebedev's post in LiveJournal and I want to bring some clarity. At the same time I will talk about how I attended the meeting in Roskomnadzor together with representatives of the industry.







Note: we (the Anti-Corruption Fund) have never been and will not be supporters of the existence of a registry of sites containing information that is prohibited for distribution in Russia (hereinafter, for brevity, I will call it a “forbidden registry”). We are quite confident that the attempts of the general government to regulate this issue (with the words “general regulation” I separate this moment from the need to prosecute certain drug dealers, etc.) both create significant problems in the industry and vice versa, attracts considerable attention to "Forbidden topics", thereby unknowingly advertising them. For us, the ideal, but obviously, utopian situation is when there are no registries and blacklists, and distributors of drugs and child pornography on the Internet are individually prosecuted by law enforcement agencies.



However, dreams have little to do with reality, so at this moment our primary goals in this matter are: through interaction with government agencies and various companies (providers, hosting) to achieve changes in practice in order to ensure that only banned information is added to the registry. "random blocking" of honest resources was not allowed.

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Roskomnadzor - only registry operator

To begin with, let's clarify one important thing: Roskomnadzor has never banned anyone. Roskomnadzor is only a registry operator, it does not make decisions about the prohibition of content on certain sites, this is done by the relevant authorities (Federal Drug Control Service, Ministry of Internal Affairs, Rospotrebnadzor). Therefore, to declare that “Roskomnadzor has moved to a new level of marasmus” is completely incorrect. This is doubly useless, and because the true authors of the prohibition of the sensational video of this reaction are not heard, because it is not addressed to them. It so happened that Roskomnadzor made a scapegoat in all situations of blocking resources. And in addition, it is unfair to Roskomnadzor itself, since they understand all the problems of the situation, are ready to constantly meet with the industry and discuss how to solve these problem situations, they themselves took the initiative to create a “consultative body” to resolve such controversial situations ( when it is quite obvious that, for example, the Federal Service for Consumer Rights Protection and Human Rights, made an absurd decision about the prohibition of content, and Roskomnadzor has no authority to cancel this decision) Plus Maxim Ksenzov Ksenzov, deputy. the head of Roskomnadzor easily contacts the users via the Internet (twitter, skype) and, as you remember, already answered questions from Habrahabr users . Can you imagine that any of the deputy heads of the Federal Drug Control Service, the Ministry of Internal Affairs or Rospotrebnadzor answered questions from users so easily?

Meeting in Roskomnadzor January 17

In order not to bore you with the boring details of the discussion that took place, I will immediately bring out the most important.

Advisory body to resolve disputes

Roskomnadzor received a proposal to create a deliberative body, a working group to resolve controversial situations (as an example: absurd decisions about the prohibition of content). In what form and composition this body can be created is the subject of further discussions.

Three working days, not three days

Roskomnadzor also ensured that changes were made to the rules of interaction between Roskomnadzor and hosting sites, site owners: now, not three days, but three working days will be given to eliminate violations (blocking content to avoid getting the resource on the black list). Understanding that even three working days is very little exists in Roskomnadzor. But again, in order to establish what time period for taking measures would be more correct to prescribe, further meetings and discussions with industry representatives are necessary.

"Accreditation" of hosters at Roskomnadzor

This is also a proposal from Roskomnadzor. Here we are not talking about some "licensing" hosting. This is a closer acquaintance of Roskomnadzor with existing hosting. This is necessary so that when a decision is made about the presence of prohibited content on one of the sites, Roskomnadzor can quickly contact the hosting and inform them about it, thereby preventing the site and the network IP address from getting to the black list (which is fraught with some providers will block the entire IP address altogether).

Once again: this is not “coercion” and not “obligatory”. The lack of hosting in the list of “accredited”, or, if you please, “trusted list”, is fraught with only slower interaction with Roskomnadzor. De facto, such a “list” is already in effect - in the form of “personal contacts” with representatives of major hosting sites and resources (Google, Livejournal, etc.)



How can I get to the list of "trusted" hosts?



It was proposed to develop some form on the Roskomnadzor website, where hosting, a large resource can provide information about itself, give operational contacts, after which it will be included in the list of "trusted". This form is currently being developed.



What is the advantage of hosting clients from the fact that their hosting is in the list of "trusted"?



The owner of an honest resource, knowing that the hosting he uses is on the list of “accredited to Roskomnadzor”, can be sure that he will not fall victim to “accidental blocking”, when a really forbidden site will be on the same IP as it, it will be blacklisted and as a result, the IP will be filtered by some providers.

Other problems arising from the implementation of the law on the registry

Representatives of the industry at the meeting gave Roskomnadzor a number of problematic issues that need to be resolved. These are the deadlines for meeting the requirements for blocking unlawful content, and the procedure for appealing decisions about the presence of prohibited content (now the “defendant” faces only the fact of being prohibited, and he does not receive the reasoning part of the decision, respectively, cannot substantively challenge it in court), the problem with IP address filtering, and the problem of blocking forbidden resources on the "clouds" (where the IP address can quickly dynamically change).

A little bit about the promotion of suicide and Rospotrebnadzor

As I wrote at the beginning of the post, it is not Roskomnadzor that makes decisions about the existence of suicide propaganda, but Rospotrebnadzor .



What is this body? For ease of understanding: these are former sanitary epidemiological stations that have become a federal service and have additionally taken over a number of functions from the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade of the Russian Federation (in terms of consumer protection).



Already by this definition alone it is clear that the department is sooo far from understanding the specifics of the Internet, technology, etc. This is also evident from the decisions taken: every new decision about the presence of suicide propaganda is more absurd than the previous one.

Plans of the Fund for the fight against corruption in terms of solving the problems of the conclusions of Rospotrebnadzor

Now we are preparing inquiries to the Rospotrebnadzor about the criteria and methods by which their experts determine the presence of suicide propaganda in the content in question. After receiving the answer, perhaps we will write an appeal to the prosecutor's office, in which we will point out the need for more careful control over the decisions of the Federal Service for Supervision of Labor and Social Affairs, leading to such scandals.

A little bit about pornography and more global plans.

The criminal code contains article 242 , which introduces responsibility for the distribution of pornography. Most often it is used against owners of shops of compact discs, films, when they establish the fact of the sale of pornography during a test purchase. But in the Russian legislation there is no clear description of what pornography is and how it differs from erotica (the sale of which is not prohibited). Accordingly, in order to prove the fact of the sale of pornography, the Investigation Committee during the investigation of these crimes sends the seized material to the expert council (not the forensic center), which includes representatives of culture, health, etc. This tip looks at the material provided and makes a conclusion: is it pornography?



Our proposal is to take over the functions of Rospotrebnadzor regarding the decision on the existence of suicide propaganda and pass it on to this council. Make it permanent at the forensic center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia (due to the difficulty of establishing the fact of suicide propaganda ).



Note: many will say “why? it is necessary to remove this criterion from the list of forbidden. ” We agree with you, but again, we proceed from the understanding that we definitely cannot achieve such cardinal changes (there is no political will from the relevant individuals for this). Therefore, we must at least improve, correct what we have now.



It is clear that such a removal of a function from one department, the transfer of them to another is a huge, complex, lengthy work. Therefore, we still have a number of meetings with State Duma deputies, members of the government and the open government of the Russian Federation. Moreover, not so long ago, Mikhail Abyzov met with representatives of Rospil regarding the fight against corruption in public procurement.



We are also preparing a request to the Forensic Science Center at the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia about whether there are methods for determining the propaganda of suicide, what are the criteria.



Thank you for your patience to read such a long post :)