Authorities plan to block Wikipedia for articles about VPN services – Kommersant

Wikipedia may be blocked in Russia under a new law banning the popularization of VPNs. According to Anton Gorelkin, deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy, the technical solution necessary for this is already being developed by employees of ROCIT (Regional Public Center for Internet Technologies).

The deputy drew attention to the existence of an article on Wikipedia that describes ways to bypass blocking and “strongly recommends that users use them.” At the same time, Anton Gorelkin noted that Roskomnadzor had complaints against Wikipedia before.

“There are legal grounds for blocking Wikipedia; all that remains is to ensure that this does not cause severe discomfort among users,” the deputy wrote in Telegram. According to him, all the information from the online encyclopedia has already been duplicated on the BDT portal, Ruviki and Runiversalis. “All that remains is to make sure that following a link to a Wikipedia article, the user is prompted to open its secure version on one of its Russian analogues. The technical solution necessary for this is already being developed by ROCIT experts,” the parliamentarian added.

From March 1 Roskomnadzor started blocking access to materials on ways and means of bypassing blocking, including VPN services. The agency will also block sites that describe the benefits of using bypass tools or advertising them.

How the ban on the popularization of services will work – in the Kommersant material “VPN’s advertising period has ended”.

Anastasia Larina