Igrick: Brief follow-up on recent news
This is a translation of this entry by igrick. It clarifies the events of the past couple of days which are:
1. Russian Federal Surveillance Service for Mass Media and Communications (Roskomnadzor) sent notices to YouTube, LiveJournal, and four other websites demanding that they cease the "illegal" publication of Russians' personal information, or shut down altogether.
2. The court of Yaroslavl city declared that all access to LJ should be blocked because some LJ page has published extremist content.
Unfortunately there is no more info on that in English, but basically Russian Internet understandably freaked out (and I think LJ did too, a little bit). So igrick takes time to give some explanations.
First about hysterics story with Roskomnadzor. We managed to learn the truth of the matter after contacting the federal agency itself. This is simple as 2 cents. There was a complaint from one LJ user about another LJ user who had published first user's personal information without their consent (for trolling purposes).
Abuse Team had already blocked second user as per Invasion of Privacy part of Abuse Policies and Procedures. However they've registered under different usernames and continued to violate the rules. First user gave up and took their complaints to Roskomnadzor.
I will not disclose this person's username but will mention that they are not a popular blogger.
I should mention that Roskomnadzor really did send us a paper letter to our USA office - I think we'll get it in about a month. Email was only sent yesterday but unfortunately it was sent to a non-existing address. Well, at least now everyone knows how and were such complaints should be made so I consider this case closed. As they say: page one story didn't happen.
Now about Yaroslavl. We have learned about it from mass media. Prosecution appealed to court, court passed the ruling, internet provider closed access. We were not involved in the proceedings and were not aware of them.
We are going to investigate this, of course. If there any hate speech (as defined by Hate Speech section of Abuse policies) is present, the journal in question will be suspended without any hassle with courts and other prosecution.
All this will be clear as soon as we see the court's ruling - if we will be able to see it. Right now we do not know which journal has violated the rules.
And in regards to technical side of the question: IP only has the ability to block LJ as a service in it's entirety but not the specific journal. They can't really filter http traffic, can they.
Upd: If the screenshot of court's ruling that is being passed around online right now is real then it's really something. I will keep you in the loop on this.
Don't change the channel.
1. Russian Federal Surveillance Service for Mass Media and Communications (Roskomnadzor) sent notices to YouTube, LiveJournal, and four other websites demanding that they cease the "illegal" publication of Russians' personal information, or shut down altogether.
2. The court of Yaroslavl city declared that all access to LJ should be blocked because some LJ page has published extremist content.
Unfortunately there is no more info on that in English, but basically Russian Internet understandably freaked out (and I think LJ did too, a little bit). So igrick takes time to give some explanations.
First about hysterics story with Roskomnadzor. We managed to learn the truth of the matter after contacting the federal agency itself. This is simple as 2 cents. There was a complaint from one LJ user about another LJ user who had published first user's personal information without their consent (for trolling purposes).
Abuse Team had already blocked second user as per Invasion of Privacy part of Abuse Policies and Procedures. However they've registered under different usernames and continued to violate the rules. First user gave up and took their complaints to Roskomnadzor.
I will not disclose this person's username but will mention that they are not a popular blogger.
I should mention that Roskomnadzor really did send us a paper letter to our USA office - I think we'll get it in about a month. Email was only sent yesterday but unfortunately it was sent to a non-existing address. Well, at least now everyone knows how and were such complaints should be made so I consider this case closed. As they say: page one story didn't happen.
Now about Yaroslavl. We have learned about it from mass media. Prosecution appealed to court, court passed the ruling, internet provider closed access. We were not involved in the proceedings and were not aware of them.
We are going to investigate this, of course. If there any hate speech (as defined by Hate Speech section of Abuse policies) is present, the journal in question will be suspended without any hassle with courts and other prosecution.
All this will be clear as soon as we see the court's ruling - if we will be able to see it. Right now we do not know which journal has violated the rules.
And in regards to technical side of the question: IP only has the ability to block LJ as a service in it's entirety but not the specific journal. They can't really filter http traffic, can they.
Upd: If the screenshot of court's ruling that is being passed around online right now is real then it's really something. I will keep you in the loop on this.
Don't change the channel.