Since 2012, Russia has passed legislation, which bans websites containing drug-related or militant material or child pornography. Earlier, Reddit was banned over a single thread about psychedelic mushrooms and now Russia bans Wikipedia for containing information on a type of cannabis.
Russia’s Roscomnadzor agency is the one, which ordered Internet providers to block access to a page on the Russian-language version of Wikipedia. Wikipedia employs HTTPS, like Reddit and the only way for the Russian government to censor that single page is to take the entire Wikipedia site completely offline until the Russian agency gets its way.
Russia bans Wikipedia because it refused to comply with the request of the government agency and instead made a small change to the URL of the charas hashish article and the link is now accessible at a new URL on its website.
Russia bans Wikipedia and Roskomnadzor, the government agency, said in a statement:
“In the event that Wikipedia refuses to comply with the court’s ruling, Roskomnadzor will block the webpage on Russian territory using the registry of illegal information. In this case, insofar as Wikipedia has decided to function on the basis of https, which doesn’t allow restricting access to individual pages on its site, the entire website would be blocked. ”
According to Sputnik News, Wikipedia.ru has vowed to appeal the decision and the site was available to Russian citizens as of 1800 GMT on Monday. So it is not clear if ISPs have taken action for the request.
Why Russia is so obsessed with cannabis?
According to critics, the Russian government restricts Internet freedoms and bans content to protect children from the harmful information. If information is readily available on Internet that points to drugs, children can be attracted towards it and can be harmful for them and can ruin their whole life. Russia bans Wikipedia so that children are not able to access that information regarding drugs.
I think Russia is correct on its part because such information should not be available to children. What do you think guys, Is Russia correct on its part? Share your views in the comments section below.