“We need to work out an effective system to control the data released on the net," Ivan Sydoruk says.
Photo: Igor Rodin
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Security Officials Mull over Censorship on the Net
Authorities must have a legal control over the Internet “to step efforts to fight with extremism,” Russian Deputy Prosecutor General Ivan Sydoruk said Thursday in yet another piece of criticism from the silovikis of slack oversight of the net. Human rights activities say that any state control over the Internet will create persecuted “cyberdissidents.” IT specialists argue that censorship in the Internet is next to impossible.
“The Internet is often a place for circulating extremist leaning information,” Ivan Sydoruk told a police conference in Rostov-on-Don on Thursday. “We need to work out an effective system to control the data released there in line with law.”
In another recent anti-Internet statement, Federal Security Service Director Nikolay Partushev called for strict control over the net. “There are currently 5,000 web-site run by extremist organizations and movements,” he said on June 5.
State Duma Legislature Committee Chairman Pavel Krasheninnikov came up with a bill last year to sentence Internet extremists to five years in prison. The amendments, however, were not adopted.
Human Rights activists issued a statement Thursday, urging authorities “not to encroach upon the Internet freedom.” “The silovikis are carrying out the president’s suggestion to step up the fight with extremism and looking for it everywhere, even on the net,” Oleg Orlov from the Memorial movement told Kommersant. The head of the Moscow Helsinki Group Lyudmila Alexeeva reminded that there are only a few countries – including Communist North Korea – that control the net.
Internet specialists note the Russian Internet market is virtually impossible to control. Russian authorities apparently want to have a Chinese Interment in the country, a top manager at a major Internet provider told Kommersant. “But they don’t understand that’s technically impossible,” he said. “China has got the only one international Internet channel which is owned by the state. In Russia, each major provider has got several channels.”
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of June 22, 2007
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