The Russian Censorship committee and web regulator (Roskomnadzor) has included 29 pages of the Onion.to domain into the list of websites forbidden in Russia, the leading Russian media Gazeta.ru reports.

Roskomnadzor, the agency responsible for censorship measures implementation, followed the decision by the Federal Service of Drugs Control. The current law in Russia allows Roskomnadzor to put websites with restricted content on a special list, which is then sent to Internet providers with the requirement to block the access to those pages. 

The reason given by the authorities is that the Tor network is used to sell drugs for bitcoins. Internet providers are required to block the access to the specified drug-related websites that operate via Tor. However, those providers that block pages by IP address will automatically restrict access to the whole Onion.to domain. This is what happened with the two giant communication providers Beeline and Rostelecom. But even those providers that block pages using URL-addresses will have to ban the whole network because it uses the https crypted protocol. 

According to the Tor statistics, users in Russia currently account for the third largest group on the network. The intention to control Tor was first voiced by Russian authorities in February 2015 when Leonid Levin, chairman of the Russian State Duma Committee on Information Policy and Communication claimed that blocking the anonymising services in Russia deserved attention and would benefit computer security. The suggestion was supported by Roskomnadzor and Safe Internet League, another Russian censorship organisation, in separate statements. 

In July 2014, the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) announced a tendering process worth of $110,000 at that time for finding a method to disclose the anonymous user identities of the Tor project "to ensure the country's defence and security". The notice about the competition appeared on the state services website. The contest was open only for Russians and every proposal was charged substantial fees (RUR 195,000). 

CoinFox reported earlier that following a court decision the ban was lifted from several bitcoin websites. The access to the websites was restricted by Roskomnadzor in January 2015 after the decision of a lower legal authority. However, after the hearing in the regional court the websites were allowed back online. Earlier this week we wrote about a Dutch bill that proposes to establish data transfer surveillance on the web.

Aliona Chapel