Russia penalizing social media networks for not censoring protest memes

RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS - In Brief 28 Jan 2021 by Alex Teddy
On January 27 Moscow's communications regulator (Roskomnadzor) announced fines levied on seven social media networks that did not remove pro-Navalny videos. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki and YouTube were all found to be in breach of a law that obliges them to remove content that incites minors to protest.Because any social media post can be seen by a minor, any social media post can be willfully misinterpreted by the government as an incitement to make minors protest. Censorship is explicitly forbidden under the constitution. The government gets around this by pretending that its ban on protests is for child protection.Navalny's video about the USD 1.4 billion palace used by Putin has clearly rattled the government. Putin took the unusual step of saying he does not own the palace. This is a straw man argument since no one said he owned it. The FSB owns it but the palace was for his use. The video has had over 100 million views in a country of 145 million people.Videos that Roskomnadzor targeted featured youngsters saying they were going to protest and videos on how to conduct oneself at a rally.State media accused the opposition of being "political pedophiles". The state is trying to reframe the issue of protests as one of violence, despite the protesters' not committing any violence, whereas there has been some police brutality. Only 4% of demonstrators are under 18. But the state media keeps insisting that the opposition is brainwashing children. By contrast the government is very keen to indoctrinate children with patriotism and nostalgia for the Soviet era.Roskomadzor said that companies had previously complied with 89% of requests ...

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