President signed the law on "landing"

Vladimir Putin signed the Federal Law “On the Activities of Foreign Persons in the Information and Telecommunication Network“ Internet ”on the Territory of the Russian Federation”. According to this law, large foreign IT companies working with Russian users are required to open representative offices in Russia.

Who is covered by this law?

First, the regulation applies to:

• Foreign legal entities;
• Foreign organizations that are not legal entities;
• Foreign citizens, stateless persons.

Secondly, such foreign persons must be the owner of an Internet resource, access to which during the day is more than 500,000 Internet users located on the territory of the Russian Federation.

Third, the "connection" with Russia of such persons is established according to one of the following criteria:

• The Internet resource distributes information in Russian, the languages ​​of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation;
• The resource is used for advertising aimed at attracting the attention of consumers located on the territory of the Russian Federation;
• The person processes information about users located on the territory of the Russian Federation;
• The person receives funds from Russian individuals and legal entities.

In addition, the following persons are also recognized as foreign persons on the Internet on the territory of the Russian Federation:

• Foreign hosting providers or other persons providing placement of information resources on the Internet, whose users are located on the territory of the Russian Federation;
• Foreign operators of the advertising system, that is, information systems and computer programs that are designed and used to organize the distribution of advertisements posted on third-party websites available to Russian users;
• Foreign persons who ensure the functioning of information systems and (or) software for receiving, transmitting, delivering and (or) processing electronic messages from Internet users of Russian users.

What are the requirements for foreign persons?

The above persons will have to:

• Create a branch / open a representative office / establish a Russian legal entity;
• Place on the information resource an electronic form for sending applications from Russian citizens and organizations;
• Register a personal account on the Roskomnadzor website.

The relevant branch, representative office or legal entity must provide:

• Reception and consideration of appeals of Russian citizens or organizations to a foreign person, execution of court decisions, decisions of state bodies of the Russian Federation;
• Representation of interests of a foreign person in courts;
• Taking measures on the territory of the Russian Federation to restrict access to information and (or) delete information distributed in violation of the legislation of the Russian Federation.

Register of foreign persons

Roskomnadzor will maintain on its website a special list of “foreign persons operating on the Internet on the territory of the Russian Federation”, which should indicate information on the compliance of resource owners with the requirements applicable to them in connection with violations of sanctions.

Sanctions

Among the complex of measures to force IT companies to comply with the legislation of the Russian Federation is informing users of Internet resources about violations of the legislation of the Russian Federation, bans on the distribution of advertising on an information resource, on making payments, on search results, on the collection and cross-border transfer of personal data of Russians. As a last resort, the possibility of partial or complete blocking of the offending resource is provided.

Federal Law "On the Activities of Foreign Persons in the Information and Telecommunication Network" Internet "on the Territory of the Russian Federation"