FAS rendered YouTube and torrents from Russian jurisdiction
The Federal Antimonopoly Service clarified its position regarding online casino advertising, which is massively placed in Russian-language films on torrent trackers and on YouTube videos. Advertising in Russian is clearly designed for a Russian-speaking audience. The corresponding request to the supervisory authority in the middle of April was sent by the Internet Video Association, which unites the online cinema ivi.ru, Megogo, TVZavr, Amediateka and TV1000Play. She drew attention to the “gross and repeated” violation of the law “On Advertising” by the Youube service, where “in many videos” advertisements of the online casino AdmiralX and Azino777 are placed.
As is known, advertising of gambling and their organizers in accordance with art. 27 of the Law "On Advertising". However, in this case, FAS has no complaints against advertisers and content distributors. Andrei Kashevarov, deputy head of the FAS, explained in response that the “virtual territory of the Russian Federation” is only the sites registered in three domain zones - .ru, .su and . . And the video service YouTube belonging to the American company Google is registered in the domain zone .com. It is not part of the Runet, therefore, the official stated, the service “does not have the authority to consider the issue set out in the appeal.”
This is a very original interpretation of the law, according to lawyers.
This interpretation is quite interesting. If we interpret the law in this way, then torrent trackers and other sites fall out of Russian jurisdiction. Their owners may believe that they do not disseminate information on the territory of Russia - and therefore, may not comply with Russian legislation. The same social network "Vkontakte" is registered on the domain vk.com.
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For example, Roskomnadzor uses a fundamentally different approach. The press service of the regulator explained that the definitions related to the functioning of the Internet (website, website page, domain name, network address, etc.) give Art. 2 of the Law “On Information, Information Technologies and Protection of Information”. The law does not divide information resources into containing Russian-language content and all the rest and applies to all Internet resources available in Russia .
For this reason, Roskomnadzor blocks any foreign websites and IP addresses that are involved in prohibited activities from the point of view of Russian legislation: they distribute child pornography, sell drugs, provide a proxy service for the Telegram messenger, etc.
But according to the interpretation of the Federal Antimonopoly Service, the law “On Advertising” covers only three domain zones .ru, .su and ..
Fyodor Kravchenko, managing partner of the MediaWeight College, welcomed the FAS’s attempt to determine the scope of Russian jurisdiction on the Internet, but expressed the opinion that “in the medium term, [such a definition] will suit FAS itself”. It turns out that many sites are allowed to actually ignore the law “On Advertising” because they are registered in foreign or international domain zones.
In an interview with RBC, the general director of the Internet Video Association, Alexei Birdin, expressed complete discouragement at the FAS response: “Being in competition with YouTube, Russian video services can expect FAS to have a unified approach to the current restrictions in advertising regardless of domain zones,” he said.
YouTube is one of the most popular resources with Russian users. Attendance of the most popular channels amounts to millions of people, and from this site the content is distributed almost without censorship.
According to Mediascope statistics, in February 2018, the daily Russian audience of YouTube was 16.1 million people aged 12–64 years living in large cities. Only the audience from Yandex (23.7 million), VKontakte (23 million) and Google (in the .ru and .com domains) has a larger audience. Thus, YouTube is de facto the largest video service in Russia and one of the leading players in the online advertising segment.
It can be assumed that the interpretation of the “virtual territory of the Russian Federation” by the deputy head of the FAS, Andrei Kashevarov, is nothing more than a legal case, and in the future the department will clarify its position. On the other hand, it is not entirely clear what measures FAS will then take to prevent the spread of illegal Internet advertising in Youtube videos and in movies on torrent trackers. In the first case, you can count on cooperation from Google, but in the second case, torrent trackers like Rutracker are already squeezed out of the legal field, outside of Russian jurisdiction and even blocked by Roskomnadzor. Will copyright holders and online cinemas seek help from the administration of the blocked Rutracker?
UPD. FAS position on online casino advertising on YouTube .
As is known, advertising of gambling and their organizers in accordance with art. 27 of the Law "On Advertising". However, in this case, FAS has no complaints against advertisers and content distributors. Andrei Kashevarov, deputy head of the FAS, explained in response that the “virtual territory of the Russian Federation” is only the sites registered in three domain zones - .ru, .su and . . And the video service YouTube belonging to the American company Google is registered in the domain zone .com. It is not part of the Runet, therefore, the official stated, the service “does not have the authority to consider the issue set out in the appeal.”
This is a very original interpretation of the law, according to lawyers.
This interpretation is quite interesting. If we interpret the law in this way, then torrent trackers and other sites fall out of Russian jurisdiction. Their owners may believe that they do not disseminate information on the territory of Russia - and therefore, may not comply with Russian legislation. The same social network "Vkontakte" is registered on the domain vk.com.
')
For example, Roskomnadzor uses a fundamentally different approach. The press service of the regulator explained that the definitions related to the functioning of the Internet (website, website page, domain name, network address, etc.) give Art. 2 of the Law “On Information, Information Technologies and Protection of Information”. The law does not divide information resources into containing Russian-language content and all the rest and applies to all Internet resources available in Russia .
For this reason, Roskomnadzor blocks any foreign websites and IP addresses that are involved in prohibited activities from the point of view of Russian legislation: they distribute child pornography, sell drugs, provide a proxy service for the Telegram messenger, etc.
But according to the interpretation of the Federal Antimonopoly Service, the law “On Advertising” covers only three domain zones .ru, .su and ..
Fyodor Kravchenko, managing partner of the MediaWeight College, welcomed the FAS’s attempt to determine the scope of Russian jurisdiction on the Internet, but expressed the opinion that “in the medium term, [such a definition] will suit FAS itself”. It turns out that many sites are allowed to actually ignore the law “On Advertising” because they are registered in foreign or international domain zones.
In an interview with RBC, the general director of the Internet Video Association, Alexei Birdin, expressed complete discouragement at the FAS response: “Being in competition with YouTube, Russian video services can expect FAS to have a unified approach to the current restrictions in advertising regardless of domain zones,” he said.
YouTube is one of the most popular resources with Russian users. Attendance of the most popular channels amounts to millions of people, and from this site the content is distributed almost without censorship.
According to Mediascope statistics, in February 2018, the daily Russian audience of YouTube was 16.1 million people aged 12–64 years living in large cities. Only the audience from Yandex (23.7 million), VKontakte (23 million) and Google (in the .ru and .com domains) has a larger audience. Thus, YouTube is de facto the largest video service in Russia and one of the leading players in the online advertising segment.
It can be assumed that the interpretation of the “virtual territory of the Russian Federation” by the deputy head of the FAS, Andrei Kashevarov, is nothing more than a legal case, and in the future the department will clarify its position. On the other hand, it is not entirely clear what measures FAS will then take to prevent the spread of illegal Internet advertising in Youtube videos and in movies on torrent trackers. In the first case, you can count on cooperation from Google, but in the second case, torrent trackers like Rutracker are already squeezed out of the legal field, outside of Russian jurisdiction and even blocked by Roskomnadzor. Will copyright holders and online cinemas seek help from the administration of the blocked Rutracker?
UPD. FAS position on online casino advertising on YouTube .
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/358678/
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