Russia Government to Fine the Search Engines Linked to Banned VPN and Internet proxy services

Russian government proposed a bill to fine search engines that linking users to banned VPN services and other anonymizers. Also the law fines search engines if they provide details on blocked sites.

According to Duma, if the individual breaks the law they will be fined in range between 3,000 and 5,000 rubles, for officials 50,000 rubles and legal entities will be fined between 500,000 to 700,000 rubles.

VPN & Proxy

VPN allows you to create a virtual network like a local one, but the computers are not physically connected to each other. It is also capable of transferring corporate IP traffic using the secure protocol.

Proxy Server has been used in enormous cases where some personal data or information have been misused illegally against an entity in the past. The proxy server is also designed to build up a wall between the user and the internet.

Search Engines in Russia

Yandex and Google cover most of the search engine market in Russia, according to StatCounter they have the market share of 96.35%.

Russia has been attempting to strengthen internet censorship, from the mid of 2017, hundreds of websites that contain illegal content are blocked at ISP level and that leads to the continuous growth of VPN service in Russia.

What exactly is banned?

The VPN and Proxy service providers that get access to the blacklisted websites are banned, and the VPN operators should register themselves with Government regularity authority.

Search engines like Google and Yandex should shield users from accessing to the banned websites says banki.ru.

The law comes into force after 90 days from the publication and those who failed to comply the system will be fined and placed in the blocked list maintained by Russian telecoms watchdog Roscomnadzor.