Repression in slow motion

Slow Internet, no doubt, can be attributed to the greatest disasters of our time. What was previously broken on the bumpy road the cart wheel, has today become a small cog on the screen or a creeping line download: people sitting in front of them, and I despair. In total, the Federal government and Internet service providers it is planned to spend € 100 billion on the development of broadband network in order to root out this scourge until 2025.

In Russia, as often happens, the opposite is true. Some streets there are still in a medieval state. But the Internet is flying. Less than 20 euros per month you can purchase a mobile tariff plan which you can even watch TV. If you follow the will of the Kremlin, now the operators will have to invest millions to the Internet again became slower.

At least for the elite services. And that lack of cooperation with authorities and not complying with the decisions of the Russian courts. It follows from the text of the bill reported by economic newspaper “Vedomosti”. Brussels and Berlin are also aware of the problem, and Google and Facebook react very reluctantly. Using choke Moscow wants to create a means of pressure to compel the Corporation to cooperate: if you don’t block a group in Facebook, which we classify as extremist, if not give us access to encrypted lines of communication that interests us, we push on the brake!

Blocking of certain services under the current law is already possible. However, while the state only afraid of such radical measures. The only social network for job search, Linked-In was blocked in November — a warning shot for everyone else. Before the presidential elections that will take place next year, blocking the Internet would produce a bad impression, I believe Russian observers. Internet surfing in slow motion could be sufficient to ensure that users have lost interest, but would not look so repressive.

To slow down the fun but it would be time-consuming and expensive. Many mobile operators have already installed equipment. For example, it reduces data transfer speed if the established rate limit is exhausted, while at the same time, some services such as WhatsApp can be used on without speed limits. But operators of fixed telephony needed for this upgrade. Only the leader of branch “Rostelecom”, according to him, the need to spend more than $ 100 million.

In addition, the industry has not yet digested the recent tightening of the law. Adopted last summer, the anti-terrorism package requires that Russian telecommunications company was recording all traffic of its users and kept it for three years. To do this, throughout Russia, not available in sufficient memory. Even Edward Snowden (Edward Snowden), who after his revelations of the NSA (NSA) took refuge in Moscow, criticized the law as “repressive”. He estimates the cost at $ 33 billion.

If the company will shift them to the shoulders of customers, a fixed rate of 20 Euro will remain in the past. In this case, Russia will successfully keep itself at the European level.

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