Vice President of Mail.ru proposed creating a body that checks jokes for extremism

Vice President of Mail.ru Group (owns the Russian social networks VKontakte and Odnoklassniki) Vladimir Gabrielyan proposed creating an expert body that would evaluate publications on social networks for extremism. His words are reported by TASS.

Speaking at the Public Chamber, Gabrielyan emphasized that the current body of examinations on extremism cases needs to be reformed, since experts perceive the materials sent to them as a priori extremist.

“It seems to me that it is very important to reform this particular examination body in such a way that it is a precisely qualified examination, so that the examination looks at the materials through the eyes of the user, so that it understands that sometimes a joke is just a joke,” Gabrielyan said. He suggested that the new body could include members of the Public Chamber, human rights activists and “specialists who determine the harmfulness of materials.”

In addition, the vice president of Mail.ru Group proposed decriminalizing Articles 282 and 148 of the Criminal Code and amnestying those convicted of actions on the Internet. previously Mail.ru Group has made such statements.

A broad discussion about the need to soften Articles 282 and 148 of the Criminal Code began in the summer of 2018. Mediazona talked in detail about who was for and who was against liberalization.

On September 20, the Plenum of the Supreme Court adopted a resolution that supplements the rules for considering cases of inciting hatred or hostility (Article 282 of the Criminal Code) for publications on the Internet. The Supreme Court ordered the courts to assess the significance of the alleged crime, taking into account the scope of the audience; in addition, judges were instructed to be critical of expert opinions, which cannot in themselves constitute evidence of the defendant’s guilt.

On October 3, President Vladimir Putin introduced a bill on the partial decriminalization of Part 1 of Article 282 of the Criminal Code. He proposed punishing the first violation under it administratively rather than criminally.