Russia Uses New Internet Censorship Bill To Silence Prominent Reporters Who Criticized The Government

from the for-the-children! dept

Last summer, Russia passed an internet blacklist bill which required ISPs to censor certain sites. At the time, of course, Russian officials insisted it would be used to "protect the children" from "harmful information," including child porn, suicide instructions, and pro-drug propaganda. They insisted it would not go beyond that. Of course, within weeks, a popular blogging site, LiveJournal, was censored, followed by the Russian equivalent of Wikipedia.

And now they're targeting journalists as well. Access is reporting that added to the blacklist has been a site used by prominent free speech / civil liberties reporters in Russia who have been critical of the government. The government claims (of course) that they put the site on the blacklist due to "child pornography elements," but Access points out that rather than just removing such content, they've blocked access to the entire site, which is notable given the usage by critical reporters.
At least two prominent journalists host their blogs on LJRossia.org: Andrei Malgin, a journalist who has been very critical of the government and hosts a mirror site at LJR, and Vladimir Pribylovsky, who has been targeted for publishing a large database of government misdeeds and for disclosing official documents that expose corruption.
Once you've set up tools that enable censorship, you know they'll eventually be used for censorship.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: censorship, critics, free speech, internet, russia


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 3:55am

    democracy has become a dirty word and more so-called democratic countries are following the same path as Russia and other similar-minded countries. the reason is obvious. governments are doing whatever they can to stifle criticism. they are doing whatever they can to remove what freedom and privacy people have left. they are doing whatever they can to obtain and maintain complete surveillance on the ordinary people (the rich, the famous and the powerful are, of course, exempt!). they are doing whatever they can to stop people in one country from communicating with those in another country, particularly when there are conflicts happening. yet all these 'democratic countries' condemn Russia, China, N.Korea etc, whilst doing the exact same thing, ruling with as iron a grip as they can get away with!!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 4:37am

      Re:

      They just want to go back to the good old days.
      btw, are/were there any real democracies?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Valkor (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 8:04am

        Re: Re:

        Depends on your definition of "real". Athens was the most directly democratic, but was limited to certain males. Direct democracy really breaks down for a lot of reasons in large groups. Representative democracy works better when small groups of people elect representatives than when large groups do.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        zeenarg, 27 Mar 2013 @ 4:16am

        ...

        We don't have democracies and didn't. Our goverment just make see that Russia is good.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 15 Feb 2013 @ 7:58am

      Re:

      The US isn't a "Democratic" country, it is a "Constitutional Replublic"

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Shadow Dragon (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 4:02am

    Thin Skin Government

    Oh I find out pathetic.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    vegetaman (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 4:45am

    Leaders change but the oppression remains the same.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Ninja (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 5:01am

    And our usual critics keep being intellectually dishonest and yelling that no system will ever be abused by the Governments. Riiiight.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 5:22am

      Re:

      Child porn has been censored in the US for years. We've managed to not censor wikipedia.

      Article is nothing but FUD. As usual.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 5:40am

        Re: Re:

        If only you applied half the criticism towards the government and your copyright overlords that you do towards Techdirt...

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 7:18am

        Re: Re:

        The US censors lots stuff that not child porn, and not just in the United States as you seem to think, but worldwide via root DNS abuse. Look up Moo.com and Dajaz1.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Ninja (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 8:08am

        Re: Re:

        It's illegal. It's very, very different from being censored. I'm not sure of what was seen in that platform but regardless shutting the entire site down because one or two users uploaded is akin to shutting down a road because one or two drivers have been caught trafficking drugs.

        You seem to be confused about intentional and accidental censoring. For instance Dajaz1 was censored accidentally (and the US failed to fix it when it was thrown in their face). Regardless of what kind of censorship goes on the simple fact that the tools can cause censorship should serve as deterrent to putting such tools in place.

        Also, Wikipedia is not a good example here ;)

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous, 14 Feb 2013 @ 2:23pm

          Re: Re: Re:

          "For instance, Dajaz1 was censored accidentally". Uh-huh. Do you really believe that?!

          link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Mike Masnick (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 10:05am

        Re: Re:

        Child porn has been censored in the US for years. We've managed to not censor wikipedia.


        Very, very different. The content is illegal and the government can go after and shut down the actual content. They cannot and do not have a blacklist blocking access. In fact, when they tried that, it lost in court.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous, 14 Feb 2013 @ 2:28pm

          Re: Re: Re:

          "Child porn has been censored in the US for years". I wonder what part of "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press" the government doesn't understand. But then, when has the constitution stopped the government from doing ANYTHING?

          link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 5:31am

    Don't tell me! I know this one! They placated the people into accepting censorship to stop child pornography. Right?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 5:47am

      Re:

      As the leaders are childish when it comes to dealing with criticism,it cause involuntary reddening of the face, therefore it should be banned as pornography.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    RyanNerd (profile), 14 Feb 2013 @ 8:42am

    Not suprising

    In Soviet Russia the Internet surfs you.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 2:04pm

    So, basically, the Russian government can shut down any website it wants to by claiming it contains child pornography. Posting of actual pornography by government agents to cement the claim completely optional.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 14 Feb 2013 @ 7:12pm

    really, they normally just shoot them.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 15 Feb 2013 @ 7:57am

    it isn't censorship, thier idea of free speech isn't your idea

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 15 Feb 2013 @ 5:09pm

    Russia always comes across as a bit of a basket case.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.