Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a law that basically prohibits anonymous web surfing in his country.
In fact, with 1 in November, it bans the forms of technology that allow anonymous access to prohibited websites in Russia. This prohibition covers services that allow people to use the internet anonymously, such as virtual private networks (VCPNs) and proxies, and requires internet service providers to block websites that host these services.
Leonid Levin, Russian chairman of the parliamentary committee on information and communication policy, told the news agency RIA Novosti that the law 'includes only the restriction of access to information already prohibited by law or by a judicial decision'.
Russia's website blacklist, introduced in 2012, was originally intended to apply to websites that had content involving illegal drugs, child pornography, and suicides, but in 2013 it was expanded to include any content "suspected of extremism." The amendment allows for flexible interpretation, and let Russia ban any material that criticizes the opinions of the respective governor or appears to weaken her authority governments.
2015, for example, Russia banned briefly the Reddit and Wikipedia along with pages that have content about drug use. At the time, Nikolai Kononov, editor-in-chief of the digital magazine SecretMag.ru said that these moves were less about the content of the websites and more about showing that they can ban whatever they want, whenever they want. It's a show of intimidation."
Russia is not the only country that banned tools for anonymity Web surfing, όπως τα VPNs. Αυτόν τον μήνα η Κίνα ανακοίνωσε ότι θα θέσει περιορισμούς σε μη εξουσιοδοτημένα VPNs, και πρόσφατα, όλες οι applications VPNs have been removed from the Apple App Store version in China.
