Giovanni Leghissa <giovanni.leghissa@unito.it> writes:
Per i pigri come me ho aggiunto l'oggetto e sotto metto un estratto (arbitrario mio) del contenuto: --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- The legislation he proposed now would require tech platforms, including Facebook, Twitter and Google, to open offices in the country and register with the Internet censorship agency Roskomnadzor to help block information the Russian government doesn’t like. The objective is to put tech giants in a vulnerable position by forcing them to comply with the Kremlin’s requirements, or face the unpalatable alternatives of huge fines, a service shutdown, bans on advertising their services, or hosting ads on their platforms. “Our draft law would oblige owners of large information resources with a daily audience in Russia of at least 500,000 people to open official offices, which would fully represent their interests and answer for their activities," Khinshtein wrote on his Telegram channel. The bill is expected to be adopted by the end of June and to come into force next year. [...] The two countries’ top internet censors regularly exchange visits, including Fang Binxing, the architect of The Great Firewall; Russia and China signed several bilateral agreements on the internet, including one on cooperation in information security. That agreement underlined the importance of the sovereign internet – the idea that every nation has a right to control the internet in their country. The sovereign internet was a response to the Kremlin’s recognition that local filtering efforts — by forcing internet service providers (ISPs) to block undesirable websites, internet protocol (IP) addresses, and pages — had proved clumsy and inefficient. The videos about Putin’s palaces and the investigations into the corruption of senior officials remain accessible. The technology failed the Kremlin. [...] Recently, Russia announced its candidate to head the ITU. Rashid Ismailov, is a former deputy chief of the Russian communications ministry and a former executive at Huawei. (The election will be held in 2022). A gray-haired and mild-mannered man in his mid-50s, Ismailov speaks fluent English. He graduated from university as a historian and spent most of his career in telecom business. But his manners cannot disguise a tough stand towards internet freedoms. Smart and technically savvy, he is very proud that he was CEO of the Russian company tasked by the government to install Red Boxes throughout the country. And indeed, his effort was productive —100 % of Russian mobile traffic is filtered through sovereign internet infrastructure. Ismailov has been very honest and straight, talking at the Russian Internet Governance Forum in April. He said that the monopoly of global tech giants prevents the development of domestic companies and echoed the point of many Western countries that such firms to pay a fair share of taxes in the countries where they operate. But he used the point to reach a very different conclusion — arguing these facts made it necessary to establish new internet standards, with a goal to eliminate “digital inequality” in developing nations and adopt common standards for digital identification. That his argument has nothing to do with economics or fair competition but is purely political is clear from the first public application of the sovereign internet he had helped to build, its use forced Twitter to remove tweets and links about the recent protests in Russia. Now the Kremlin is using the same system to harass Google and to force it to take down YouTube videos the Kremlin dislikes. This offensive won’t stop with Twitter and Google, neither will it be limited to Russia’s borders — Ismailov’s ITU candidacy being the proof. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- -- 380° (Giovanni Biscuolo public alter ego) «Noi, incompetenti come siamo, non abbiamo alcun titolo per suggerire alcunché» Disinformation flourishes because many people care deeply about injustice but very few check the facts. Ask me about <https://stallmansupport.org>.