The Leninsky District Court of Saratov declared “information contained in the Tor Browser software application” prohibited, and also banned the placement of the browser application in the Google Play store for Android, Roskomsvoboda reported.
“This decision is the basis for the inclusion of information contained in the Tor Browser software application, the Tor Browser software application hosted on the Google Play software application page, in the Unified Registry of domain names, website page indexes on the Internetwork addresses that allow you to identify websites networks "Internet" containing information, the distribution of which is prohibited in the Russian Federation," the court's decision says.
The court ignored definitions from the federal law “On Information” and “accepted the position of Roskomnadzor that information, application and technology are one and the same,” said Ekaterina Abashina, a lawyer for Roskomsvoboda, who is leading the case.
Such an interpretation, according to the lawyer, also contradicts the actual structure of the Internet. The demand for Google to remove the application from the store was singled out on July 26, the Tor case was essentially heard without him, she added.
The decision to block Tor was made in December 2017, but the service remained available for a long time. Before that, the deputy prosecutor of the Saratov district of the Saratov region filed a lawsuit in which he asked to recognize the information contained on the torproject.org website as prohibited for distribution on the territory of the Russian Federation.
In December 2021, the developers of the Tor network - Tor Project - reported that they had received a notification from Roskomnadzor about the need to remove information prohibited in the Russian Federation from their website torproject.org, otherwise it would be blocked. Later that day, a message about the block appeared on the official Tor blog. The team linked it to their call to Russian users to raise network nodes.
Since December 2, some major providers and mobile operators have begun to block Tor in Russia. They no longer have access to all or almost all IP addresses of known nodes, including some bridges. Globalcheck specialists confirmed that Tor is blocked using TSPU (technical threat countermeasures) equipment - these are “black boxes” from ILVs that are installed by telecom operators, but providers themselves do not have access to these devices.
On May 19, the Saratov Regional Court overturned the decision of the court of first instance and sent the case back for a new trial. At the end of May, Roskomnadzor demanded that Google remove the Tor Browser app from the Google Play store, but it is still available for download.
Roskomnadzor unblocked the browser site in July. The agency lifted the restrictions only two months after the Saratov Regional Court overturned the decision to ban Tor Browser and sent the case back for retrial.
bbabo.Net