Experts appreciated the idea of ​​digital keys to access LGBT content

Is “Bohemian Rhapsody” propaganda?

The sensational bill to ban LGBT propaganda is slowly becoming more specific. The main idea of ​​the law is that not only propaganda, but also the demonstration of LGBT relations is prohibited for children; for adults, demonstration, but not their propaganda, is possible. Access to videos and films about same-sex love can be obtained using a special digital key only for adults.

Experts in the field of media services were skeptical about the idea. Aleksey Byrdin, director general of the Internet Video Association, explained that the developers of the bill included in the amendments some analogue of the “parental control” function.

– Parental control works as follows: the user creates a personal profile in the application. Since legal platforms are paid and 90% of our revenue comes from subscriptions, we assume that our users who are able to pay for a subscription are at least 18 years old. If a person has children, he independently sets special settings for him in his user profile. We, as service providers, have no right to interfere with privacy. Parental control is the functionality that we give to the subscriber. He may or may not use it. It all depends on his level of personal responsibility as a parent, – said Alexey Byrdin.

The expert drew an analogy with the sale of tobacco products and alcohol. By law, only adults can purchase them. But the seller, having checked the buyer’s passport and having given him a bottle of alcohol, should not follow the citizen to his house and check whether he safely hid the bottle in the cupboard from the children. On the issue of video content consumption, the owners of online cinemas draw the same line of delimitation of responsibility.

From a technical point of view, it is possible to implement the initiative of the deputies. Although there are no uniform standards. This can be a pin code or a unique password that will be sent to the user via SMS. However, you can really go to extremes and oblige citizens to access the Internet exclusively with a passport through the public services portal. Only bad luck – a Russian citizen receives a passport at the age of 14. From the same age, according to the law “On Communications”, he can conclude a subscription agreement and buy a SIM card from a mobile operator.

But that’s not all. Legal online cinemas are seriously afraid that due to the amendments, the lion’s share of users will go to pirate platforms. This threatens services with loss of revenue and, as a result, bankruptcy.

– In our country, there are only 25 official audiovisual services in the Roskomnadzor registry. This is a drop in the ocean compared to many pirate sites. Their traceability is zero. Who will fine them for publishing LGBT content and how? We have already discussed with the State Duma that it is unacceptable to regulate only what is at arm’s length. It is necessary to refine the control mechanism, for example, by blocking prohibited content. At the moment, colleagues obviously have not twisted this bill, – Alexey Byrdin complains.

In addition, experts do not understand on what principle the filter will be set: is there propaganda in the film or not. Take, for example, the movie Bohemian Rhapsody. The life story of the leader of the Queen band Freddie Mercury on the screen is replete with scenes of same-sex relationships, which in fact caused the tragedy – HIV infection and death. In essence, this, in the language of lawmakers, is simply a “demonstration”. But it was beautifully shot and diluted with an audio sequence from Queen’s masterpieces. What if someone listens to “I want it all” and decides to change their orientation in the middle of the second verse?

– The arbiter in such matters should not be the owners of the venues and not the deputies. Neither one nor the other has the appropriate competence. It is up to a group of independent experts — psychologists, teachers and linguists — to decide whether there is LGBT propaganda or not, – Aleksey Byrdin is sure.

Cybersecurity expert Andrei Masalovich, on the contrary, sees nothing impossible in the form of strict filtering of such content. The Chinese have the necessary experience.

– The Chinese very strictly limited the penetration of harmful content into the country, – said Masalovich, – But this requires terminal servers on their territory. They completely banned VPNs, introduced the most severe censorship and created their own ecosystem. If now all social networks and the global Internet are closed at once, the Chinese will not even notice it. Strict technical control of traffic, censorship and its own controlled platforms – this is the three-legged elephant on which China stands. Trying to catch individual films or clips in search of propaganda is pointless. If you need to catch one mosquito in a room, you can easily do it. If you have a swarm of mosquitoes in your room, running around and waving your arms is useless.