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Attempts by extremists to infiltrate the internet should be blocked by law enforcement bodies, members of the internet industry, IT specialists and bloggers
RUSSIA-INTERENT-SECURITY-OPINION
16.02.2013 1:14:01 MSK
Moscow. 16th February. INTERFAX.
The head of the Civil Society Fund, Konstantin Kostin told INTERFAX that the implementation of President Putin’s initiative to block attempts by extremists to infiltrate the internet will require not only the legislative coordination of intelligence services (which are at present lacking in authority) but also a well planned system of interaction between internet users and bloggers.
‘It would be logical on the part of legislators to review the laws to see whether or not the legislative organs have sufficient authority to cope with this threat. And if they do not, then it seems sensible to make amendments’ said Kostin, speaking on Saturday.
However, according to Kostin, tweaking the legislation is only part of the work which will be necessary to counter actions by extremists on the web.
‘The Internet is a self regulated, rapidly developing communication medium. One would need to create new laws every single week in order to keep up with regulating everything that happens on the internet. Moreover the internet is a global network and a significant proportion of the platforms where this dubious information is appearing is outside Russian jurisdiction. It is therefore extremely important to have a system in place which combines the efforts of legislative organs, internet users, IT technicians and bloggers themselves.’
‘In view of the way that modern media and internet is structured, it is important to make use not only of legislation, but also to capitalize on the personal responsibility of internet users and also to make use of new technology which we do not yet have in place.’
It is important, says Kostin, to establish a system of feedback between these parties allowing them to interact to counter this problem. ‘It makes sense to start a more active dialogue with the leaders of the blogging community. A feedback system must be put in place so that people can complain or inform us if they come across information of an extremist character on various blog-platforms or internet forums’ he said.
Kostin pointed out that it would be useful to analyze accepted international methods of countering web-extremists, in a Russian context.
‘The Pentagon for example, has a Cyber Command Team made up of technicians some of whom have a very ambiguous reputation. Governments of various countries which are considered to be modern democracies, allocate a great deal of money to the promotion of correct attitudes and ideas and the prevention of incorrect ones.’
On Thursday, 14th February, President Putin ordered the FSB to block attempts by radicals to use the internet as a propaganda platform. ‘The direct link between extremists and terrorist groups is obvious. That is why we need to act as resolutely as possible to neutralize different types of extremist structures" said Putin. "It is necessary to block attempts by radical groups to use information technologies, internet resources and social networks to promote their ideas’ said Putin at a meeting of the Federal Security Service.
The State Duma Committee on Information Policy announced their support for the President to block attempts by extremists to use the internet as a propaganda tool. First Deputy Head of the Committee Leonid Levin said: ‘This is right. I fully support this and we in the Committee believe it to be a very timely move.’ He added that the Committee is ready and waiting to participate in the development of these proposals.
‘Our task is to make legislative changes to promote optimal performance by law enforcement and intelligence agencies to solve this problem’ said Levin. He stressed that all the necessary amendments to existing legislation would be undertaken.
