Maxim Ali has provided his comments on the introduction of administrative liability for providing links to blocked websites

On 27 June, Vladimir Putin signed a law that introduced fines for operators of search engines which provide links to websites banned in Russia.

According to the Head of the IP/IT Practice at Maxima Legal, Maxim Ali, the changes to the legislation will not impact the issue of access to prohibited resources as it will to the sharing of information about them. For example, some search engines do not provide direct links to banned websites, but to pages stating that the website is inaccessible and may list other websites which are also banned. “It turns out that the search engine, although indirectly, provides information about blocked sites. The question arises whether such a policy of transparency will change with the entry into force of the law. And will there not be a direct appeal on such databases as a new way of searching for pirated and other forbidden resources? “Maxim commented to Advokatskaya Gazeta about the amendments.

According to the law, the ban on by search engines sharing information applies only to the territory of the Russian Federation, which provides a way around the technical limitations, with the help of VPN and other means that conceal the user’s location. The law also provides for administrative liability for hosts and service providers who do not provide Roskomnazdor with information about the owners of anonymizers and VPN services. According to Maxim Ali, fines of 50,000 – 300,000 roubles for legal entities are a good reason for companies to think about updating their compliance policies.

To review the article in full, please see the Advokatskaya Gazeta website.