“We understand who we are dealing with”: the Federation Council discussed the activity of Google and Facebook in the light of interventions in the affairs of the Russian Federation

The Commission of the Council of the Federation for the Protection of State Sovereignty is preparing a request to the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation to prevent violations of the electoral legislation of the Russian Federation. For the same purpose, senators intend to invite representatives of Google and Facebook to the meeting.

This was stated by the head of the commission Andrey Klimov following the results of the meeting. According to him, the commission members were worried about “direct calls for riots in Moscow,” circulated by a number of Russian-language media.

“Including using the site of the US embassy, ​​as well as direct political advertising of campaigning nature on foreign information resources on the“ day of silence ”and a single voting day,” RIA Novosti quoted Klimov as saying.

According to him, the studies indicated that there were attempts to intervene in the electoral process in Russia, “but the final results were not the ones that the organizers expected.”

During the meeting, the commission concluded that the purpose of the intervention was not so much the elections to the Moscow City Duma as an attempt to discredit the Russian electoral system, the entire Russian government and incitement to riots in Moscow, followed by accusations of the Russian leadership of disproportionately harsh measures.

“Intervention was carried out with the help of foreign diplomats, foreign media and NGOs, using high-level foreign officials, global Internet platforms, foreign lobbying companies, Russian citizens who have received relevant training abroad, through foreign financing of Russian organizations and individuals,” it says in a statement from the Federation Council.

In addition, the Interior Ministry said that the effective work of the department’s employees allowed preventing mass riots with grave consequences in Moscow during the pre-election period.

Following a discussion of these circumstances, the senators decided to request the Investigative Committee and invite representatives of Google and Facebook to the meeting “in order to prevent the possible further use of their Internet platforms for committing illegal actions on Russian territory”.

Klimov stressed that the readiness of these foreign companies for dialogue does not mean that "they should not be punished for attempts to interfere in the affairs of the Russian Federation."

• Meeting of the Council of the Federation of the Russian Federation
• RIA News
• © Ilya Pitalev

As the senator said in an interview with RT, you need to carefully understand what happened.

“We see signs that there was interference, and we need to find out whether these were instructions from above, or some kind of arbitrariness of people on the ground, or these were some strange contractual schemes,” the senator said in an interview with RT.

According to him, the task of the parliament in this situation is prevention. The remaining issues should be addressed by authorized bodies, the senator said.

“The task of law enforcement agencies is to see if there are any illegal things there,” Klimov specified.

According to him, the main task of the commission is to ensure that Facebook, Google and other similar structures in Russia act in compliance with the law.

“We are ready to explain to them what we consider to be interference and we are ready to discuss with them how to ensure that they are not involved in these showdowns by any of our different defendants,” he said, noting that Google and Facebook had previously denied any involvement by pointing out the fault of the advertisers.

“On the one hand, we will look at what these advertisers are and how all this was placed. And on the other hand, we believe that there should be general international rules in this regard. The door is open for a normal and constructive dialogue. We understand who we are dealing with, but we offer communication with Facebook and Google, ”the senator summed up.

According to the head of the Institute of the Newest States, political scientist Alexei Martynov, foreign companies use the imperfection of the legislation regulating Internet content, which in Russia is only at the stage of formation.

“American companies care only about American laws. Based on the legislation that we already have, these Internet giants violate it, ”the expert said.

According to Martynov, the disconnection of such resources can lead to social outrage, which is what Western companies speculate. The expert acknowledged that combating such giants with conventional regulatory measures is difficult.

“These companies carry out a whole range of activities that ultimately lead to provocation of violation of the law directly by the citizens of our country,” the expert concluded.

“We are dealing with double standards”

Previously, Roskomnadzor understood the circumstances of publishing political advertising on Facebook. In early September, the department sent data on violations of Google and Facebook on election day to the State Duma commission, which is investigating foreign interference in Russia's internal affairs.

“During the monitoring of mass media on a single voting day, the facts of distribution of political advertising on the Google search engine, on the social network Facebook and on YouTube’s video hosting site were established,” Roskomnadzor said, noting that such actions can be considered as interference in the sovereign affairs of Russia.

The head of the department, Alexander Zharov, said that the publication of political advertising on Facebook against the backdrop of the elections in Russia is a manifestation of "double standards."

“That advertisement, which belongs to the political category and on which Roskomnadzor, the Public Chamber, and the Russian parliament spoke out, nothing happened to it. That’s why we say that we are clearly dealing with double standards, an attempt to influence the election results, ”he explained.

It is noteworthy that before the election, Roskomnadzor announced the sending of a request to Google and Facebook to prevent the spread of political advertising on their platforms in connection with the elections in Russia.

Then the department noted that non-compliance with these measures will be regarded as interference in the sovereign affairs of the country.

Recall that earlier the State Duma introduced a bill to block users of e-mail services and instant messengers for distributing prohibited information.

“In order to extend to electronic mail services the responsibilities imposed by the current norm of the law on messengers, the new edition establishes a common concept for them -“ the organizer of the messaging service, ”Andrei Klishas, ​​head of the Federation Council committee on constitutional law, clarified the essence of the proposed changes.