Russian Federation

[RU] Media law amended to tighten registration procedures

IRIS 2017-8:1/35

Andrei Richter

Comenius University (Bratislava)

On 29 July 2017 President Vladimir Putin signed into law amendments to the Statute on the Mass Media that further detail registration procedures for media outlets.

In particular they add to Article 7 a ban on establishing a media outlet for individuals who have been convicted for committing crimes involving the use of the media or telecommunications networks, such as the Internet, or for committing crimes related to extremist activities. An amendment to Article 19 establishes an identical ban in respect of editors-in-chief.

Article 16 of the Statute on the Mass Media on the procedure for the issuance by Roskomnadzor of warnings to media outlets prompted by “an abuse of media freedom” (see IRIS Extra 2017-1) is supplemented by the following qualification: “A warning is a non-regulatory act of the registering authority issued for the purpose of preventing violations of the media law and indicating their inadmissibility.”

An amendment to Article 27 of the Statute on the Mass Media specifically requires that each registered online media outlet provide information on its title, founders (or owners), the last name and initials of the editor-in-chief, the email address and telephone number of the editorial office, and the age ratings of associated “informational products” (see IRIS 2012-9/37).

The new provisions enter into force on 1 January 2018.


References

  • Федеральный закон "О внесении изменений в Закон Российской Федерации "О средствах массовой информации""
  • https://rg.ru/2017/08/04/smi1-dok.html

Related articles

IRIS 2012-9:1/37 [RU] Age Ratings for TV and Online Media Introduced

This article has been published in IRIS Legal Observations of the European Audiovisual Observatory.