You have the right to anonymity. Part 2. Legislation against anonymity

The first attempts to eliminate anonymity on the Web at the legislative level in Russia began to appear in 2013.

Thus, Federal Law No. 97-FZ of 05/05/2014 (“The Law on bloggers and organizers of disseminating information”, developed a year earlier) to owners of social networking pages or personal websites with a daily audience of more than three thousand users prohibited the anonymous use of their own blogs in the network . According to the amended Article 10.2 of the Federal Law No. 149-FZ “On Information”, a person recognized as a blogger by Roskomnadzor must post on his website or website page on the Internet his e-mail address and initials for sending him legally significant messages. To date, over 2,000 public and personal pages on VKontakte, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Google Plus, etc. have been added to the relevant blogger register . Yes, and ordinary small personal sites are also included in the registry nn number.
')
But in the same law there is also an article about “information dissemination organizers” - these are owners of network services, web sites and software developers who were obliged by the FSB and Roskomnadzor to collect the metadata of their users (all actions and interactions), their storage and provision to the first requirement to the competent authorities. And from July 1, 2018, from the moment the “Spring package” came into force ( No. 374-FZ dated July 6, 2016), more precisely, those points of this law that concern the implementation of total telephone and Internet surveillance of citizens, organizers of information dissemination ( as well as telecom operators) will be obliged to collect, store and share with special services not only user metadata, but all their correspondence, calls, file sharing - all the traffic generated on their sites or through their software.

Practically all the largest Russian Internet resources and services, such as Yandex, VKotakte, Mail.Ru, Odnoklassniki, dating services, various large and not very informational resources, forums, websites, even such exotic as the page The "Republican Syktyvkar Psychoneurological Boarding School" is now under the scrutiny of the FSB. Habrahabr did not escape this fate, the users of which were one of the first ( serial number 6 ) wanted to follow the security services.

In 2014, the legislation also affected anonymous payments. The Federal Law of the Russian Federation of 05/05/2014, No. 110- “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation” in terms of stricter requirements for the transfer of electronic money ”was adopted. This law introduced new norms and changes to a whole range of federal laws, setting a limit for anonymous online payments in the amount of 15,000 rubles.

However, undoubtedly, the greatest damage for the Runet was brought in by the “Spring package” adopted in 2016, involving the disclosure of all user data (in fact, totally deanonimizing all) and their electronic correspondence, calls, in a word, all generated traffic without a prior judicial act, As required by Art.23-24 of the Constitution of Russia:

Article 23
1. Everyone has the right to privacy, personal and family secrets, protection of his honor and good name.
2. Everyone has the right to confidentiality of correspondence, telephone conversations, postal, telegraph and other communications. Restriction of this right is allowed only on the basis of a court decision .

Article 24
1. The collection, storage, use and dissemination of information about the private life of a person without his consent is not allowed.
2. State authorities and local self-government bodies, their officials are obliged to provide everyone with the opportunity to familiarize themselves with documents and materials directly affecting his rights and freedoms, unless otherwise provided by law.

As well as article Art. 13 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, which allows restriction of the right of a citizen to confidentiality of correspondence, telephone and other negotiations, postal, telegraph and other communications only on the basis of a court decision .

According to the text of the law, all telecom operators and organizers of information dissemination must keep records of calls of all their subscribers and the content of text messages, including multimedia attachments, for six months, and information on communication sessions / metadata - for three years (for telecom operators) and one years (for information dissemination organizers). The content of the messages and the metadata of the company must provide the competent authorities "to perform the tasks assigned to these bodies in cases established by federal laws." If users use encryption, the dissemination organizers will need to provide the Federal Security Service with the decryption keys. Non-provision of encryption keys will incur a penalty on the company.

If in Russia before this, anonymity was fought at the level of individual amendments to existing legislation, it has recently become clear that the Russian authorities made the final decision to completely eliminate the possibility of anonymous use of the Internet. In continuation of the “Information Security Doctrine”, adopted in December 2016, the President of Russia in May 2017 signed the Strategy for the Development of the Information Society for 2017-2030, developed by the Security Council of the Russian Federation. Clause 34 of the document states that for the development of the Internet and the information infrastructure of the Russian Federation, it is necessary to conduct activities at the international level, including “creating new partnership mechanisms designed to involve a system of trust on the Internet with the participation of all institutions of the society that guarantees confidentiality and personal security users, the confidentiality of their information and excluding the anonymity, irresponsibility of users and impunity of offenders on the Internet. ” It is obvious that in the context of the adopted strategy, anonymity is considered as a flaw in network communications, allowing criminals and offenders to avoid legal responsibility.

In pursuance of the Presidential Decree in 2017-2018, we should expect new bills aimed at combating anonymity as well as technical means that ensure it in the digital environment. However, such proposals have already been heard from federal officials for quite some time, for example, the chairman of the State Duma committee on information policy and deputy Leonid Levin , presidential adviser on the Internet, German Klimenko . And even a number of bills were developed, offering to block anonymizers, VPN services and other software in the event of their refusal to cooperate with Roskomnadzor, as well as to fine citizens and legal entities for promoting their use.

And on May 24 of this year, the deputies of the three factions introduced the new draft law No. 184222-7 on the prohibition of the anonymity of messenger users to the State Duma, which would imply the corresponding amendments to the Law on Information. According to the text of the draft legislative document, identification of the user is proposed to be carried out on a cell phone number in agreement with telecom operators.

In addition to restricting “anonymity” in messengers, the bill requires their administrators to comply with certain requirements of Roskomnadzor:
“The organizer of information dissemination on the Internet, ensuring the provision of information and communication instant messaging services (hereinafter referred to as the organizer of instant messaging) must:
1) to ensure the transmission of electronic messages only to those Internet users who are identified in the manner established by the Government of the Russian Federation. The identification of Internet users is carried out by the telecom operator using the subscriber number, on the basis of an identification contract concluded by the organizer of instant messaging with the telecom operator. The standard form of the said agreement is approved by the federal executive body authorized by the Government of the Russian Federation;
2) to ensure the technical ability of users to refuse to receive electronic messages from other users;
3) to ensure the confidentiality of transmitted electronic messages;
4) to ensure the possibility of sending electronic messages on the initiative of state authorities in accordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation;
5) to restrict, upon request of the authorized federal executive body, the distribution of mass electronic messages, as well as the transfer of electronic messages containing information that is distributed in violation of the requirements of the legislation of the Russian Federation;
6) to provide the authorized federal executive body with information allowing telecom operators to fulfill the requirements established by paragraph 2.1 of Article 15.4 of this Federal Law. ”

Failure to comply with these requirements may lead to blocking the messenger:
"In the event that the organizer of instant messaging fails to comply with the requirements of the authorized federal executive body to restrict the distribution of mass electronic messages, restrict the distribution of messages to unidentified users, restrict the publication and / or transmission of electronic messages containing information that is distributed in violation of the requirements of the legislation of the Russian Federation, access to information systems and (or) programs for electronic computers, functions which is provided by the organizer of instant messaging, prior to the fulfillment of such requirements, is limited to the telecom operator providing services to provide access to the Internet, immediately on the basis of a decision of the authorized federal executive body adopted on the basis of an effective court decision and received system of interaction ".

The head of Roskomnadzor, Alexander Zharov, quite expectedly supported this new repressive bill to regulate the work of instant messengers.

And in 2013, prohibit anonymizers offered the Public Council under the FSB of Russia. The need for this idea was explained by the fact that through them users can visit forbidden sites. China and Belarus were cited as an example, where users bypass locks using such programs.

In February 2016, it became known that AZAPI (non-commercial partnership “Association for the Protection of Copyright on the Internet”) developed the text of the draft law introducing administrative responsibility for “advertising, propaganda or other calls for the use of special technical tools and methods get unhindered access "to blocked Internet resources. According to AZAPI, this text was approved in the working group at Roskomnadzor. This organization, for some reason considering the supervisory authority to be the subject of legislative initiative, will transfer the draft law to the RKN leadership for submission to the State Duma of the Russian Federation.

As is known, since 2012, Roskomnadzor has been keeping a register of banned sites; nevertheless, using the above-mentioned software that replaces the IP address of Russian users allows unrestricted access to prohibited resources, which is disturbed by the authorities and media lobbyists who trust in anti-piracy law, which allows you to block sites forever.

The second attempt to ban anonymizers on the territory of Russia by aggressive media lobbyists, now the Media and Communication Union was undertaken in the spring of 2017. To a large extent, the draft law is focused on anonymizers, proxy servers, VPN and search services, as it obliges them to block access to sites from the registry, otherwise they will be blocked.

Of course, the text of the proposed laws does not fit into any framework of constitutional norms and, in principle, a reasonable attitude to the built infrastructure of the World Wide Web. We note that at present, the use of anonymizers, proxy servers, VPN services and TOR is not prohibited by law, nor is it forbidden to disseminate information about their use (confirmed by the position of Roskomnadzor and the position of the Ministry of Communications and Mass Communications), but the fight against them is conducted at the level of law enforcement .

Publications:
Part 1. Introduction and world practice
Part 2. Legislation against anonymity
Part 3. Law enforcement struggle with anonymity tools
Part 4. (in development)
Part 5. (in development)

Prepared by:
Sarkis Darbinyan, Artyom Kozlyuk, Aliona Ryzhikova for the Center for the Protection of Digital Rights