This was to be expected: in the wake of the crisis of trust in official information, the depth of which was demonstrated by the rally of those who did not believe the number of victims of the fire in the Winter Cherry named by the Ministry of Emergency Situations, voices have emerged advocating for the introduction of criminal liability for the dissemination of knowingly false information about emergency situations. So far, these are not the voices of officials, but of loyal public figures – but their position is being replicated, including by state news agencies: for the first trial balloon to test the public reaction to the proposal to create another “information baton”, it is quite sufficient.

It’s not that these voices are heard in an information vacuum. “Social networks <...> are a murky source,” Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with Kemerovo residents on March 27, and later explained: “under no circumstances” should “information leaks through social networks, including from abroad” be allowed. The reason, apparently, was the admission of prankster Nikita Kuvikov (known online as Yevgeny Volnov) from Ukraine that he was the source of rumors about the alleged 300 deaths in a fire in Kemerovo. In itself, this is a shameless act, but it actually played into the hands of the Russian authorities, who unanimously began talking about the causes of the crisis in Kemerovo as the results of an “information war” and “proven provocation technologies.” Judging by the demand for such explanations from the authorities for a wide variety of events, this is a familiar threat – but one that has not yet been punished. The case against Kuvikov, as reported by the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, was opened in Russia under Article 282 of the Criminal Code - "Incitement of hatred or enmity", because there is no article in the Russian Criminal Code that provides for liability for various types of "information wars" and - more broadly - false information (something similar to the proposal of the activists is, for example, in the Criminal Code of Kazakhstan, which provides for punishment for the dissemination of knowingly false information, including in situations "creating a danger of violating public order or causing significant harm <...> to the interests of society or the state protected by law", up to 10 years of imprisonment).

The problem, however, is that the demand for alternative information – belief in rumors and distrust of official sources – did not arise out of nowhere, and it is not only the experience of disinformation from official sources during the Kursk, Nord-Ost and Beslan disasters. This distrust is based on a decline in trust in formal institutions in general, which sociologists have been recording for several years: for example, according to measurements by the Center for Social Research of the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, which conducts the Russian part of the research for Eurobarometer, the level of trust in various branches of government in the country has been falling since the early 2010s. At the same time, people's trust in friends and acquaintances is growing and, accordingly, in the information they provide: the more social connections a person has (and since the end of 2013, the amount of social capital, according to the head of research for Eurobarometer in Russia, sociologist Viktor Vakhshtayn, has grown by 20%), the less he or she trusts formal institutions. "This also concerns trust in the media - you trust more what you hear from friends and read on Facebook," says Vakhshtayn. According to Levada, 78% of Russians generally believe that senior officials, when talking about the state of affairs in the country, "hide the truth" or even lie, while only 30% of respondents "completely trust" the media as a whole. This also fuels interest in conspiracy theories, which simplify the analysis of too much information: it is easier to believe in simple villainy than to get to the truth.

The idea of cutting off channels for spreading rumors and false information, and any unofficial information in general, is largely logical for modern Russia, which prefers to solve problems by tightening regulations and punishment. This is simpler and, of course, much faster than restoring trust in the government and institutions, and the result is more visible. Another thing is that even the initiators of the new article of the Criminal Code advocate for the simultaneous expansion of the state's rights to disseminate the official position and information - although, it would seem, much more? At the same time, there is a danger of constructing a new trap in the formulation of "deliberately false information" - does this definition include, for example, the statement by the governor of Kuzbass Aman Tuleyev about 200 "troublemakers" on the square in Kemerovo, who "are not at all relatives of the deceased"? Or Putin's words about the absence of Russian military in Crimea? The irony of the moment: the modern Russian state is also an active player in the field of disinformation and conspiracy theories, and it is clear that it does not need competitors in this field.

Why Rumors Are So Persistent