Messengers entered in ads – Newspaper Kommersant No. 237 (7438) dated 12/21/2022
[ad_1]
It will be forbidden to connect payment systems to foreign messengers in the Russian Federation, and state-owned companies will not be able to use them to exchange personal and payment data. This follows from the bill adopted in the second reading by Deputy Anton Gorelkin on limiting foreign participation in ad services. First of all, Telegram, which is actively developing payment functionality for business, can fall under the restrictions.
On December 20, the State Duma adopted in the second reading the bill of deputy Anton Gorelkin, which in its original form provided 20% limit on foreign capital in ad placement services. The day before, new provisions were added to the document – on instant messengers owned by foreign persons.
- The project provides that from March 1, 2023, it will be forbidden to connect services to foreign messengers that allow you to transfer funds.
- In addition, state-owned companies, structures providing public services that perform “state or municipal assignments” are proposed to generally ban the use of instant messengers to transfer personal data, information about payments, transfers and bank accounts.
The bill limits the possibility of integrating payment services with foreign messengers, Anton Gorelkin’s representative confirmed. Roskomnadzor will maintain a list of such services, follows from the document.
Since 2017, the possibility of payments and money transfers has been available in Telegram, whose legal entities are registered in the UAE and the Virgin Islands. It, in particular, is used to collect donations and paid access to content. Any company can create its own payment bot in Telegram or use an existing one in the system. The ability to transfer money within instant messengers is available in WhatsApp, Messenger (owned by Meta, whose Facebook and Instagram activities are banned in the Russian Federation as extremist) and Viber. But these functions are not available in Russia. Payments within chats are also implemented in the social networks VKontakte and Odnoklassniki (owned by the Russian VK).
Ad services policies have changed. The limit on foreign participation in classifieds has been relaxed: now Russian entities must control only more than 50% of voting shares (in the first version, 75% or more). But the bar for service attendance has been tightened, starting from which restrictions apply: in the first edition it was 10 million users from the Russian Federation, and in the new one – 100 thousand per day, that is, about 3 million per month. Platforms for public procurement, organization of bankruptcy and privatization were removed from the scope of the amendments.
The requirements for services subject to the new provisions have remained: they must place an attendance counter approved by Roskomnadzor, ensure integration with public services and prevent the spread of defamatory information. Violation “entails criminal, administrative or other liability.” Avito did not answer “Kommersant”, Yulia declined to comment.
Kommersant’s interlocutor, close to the Ministry of Digital Development, notes that Mr. Gorelkin took into account industry wishes reduce the limit on foreign participation in classifieds.
But, the Kommersant source emphasizes, with the version that mentions the requirements related to the ban on integrating payment services into messengers, “the business was not familiar.”
This provision could potentially deprive Russian companies of the ability to integrate foreign messengers into their customer interaction services, says Nikolai Komlev, executive director of the Association of Computer and Information Technology Enterprises.
Formally, Telegram is subject to regulation, says Boris Edinin, deputy chairman of the commission for the legal support of the digital economy of the Moscow branch of the Russian Bar Association. However, he admits that Roskomnadzor may also include it in another category: “The legislation on information is arranged in such a way that the same service may fall under the regulation of various legal norms or fall under the requirements for different types of services.”
[ad_2]
Source link
