Google was unavailable for some users. Google added to Roskomnadzor's register of prohibited information History with blocking

Access to the Russian-language version of Google was partially blocked, as the site was included in the register of prohibited information by Roskomnadzor. This happened due to an incorrect link that was not checked in the regulator, experts say.

The google.ru page (the Russian-language version of the search engine) was included in the register of prohibited information. This was reported on June 22 by users of social networks and the correspondent of RBC was convinced through the service for checking prohibited sites of Roskomnadzor.

According to the registry, the body that initiated the blocking was the Federal Tax Service (FTS), and google.ru was blacklisted a year ago, on June 14, 2016. It was about two pages of the search engine: one had the status "access is not limited", and the other - "access is limited".

In this regard, a number of operators began to have problems loading the site. In particular, google.ru was not opened by Telecom TZ and TTK operators. The TTK representative explained this by the fact that the filtering systems work automatically, blocking domains included in the register of prohibited sites of Roskomnadzor.

A Google spokesperson said the company is aware of some users' problems accessing the site. “There are no technical problems on the Google side. We are looking into the situation,” he said.

After a short time, the page with the status "access restricted" disappeared from the registry. The representative of Roskomnadzor Vadim Ampelonsky explained to RBC that the blocking, that one of the pages of the search engine redirected to the prohibited site of the bookmaker's office. The page of the Russian-language version of Google redirected to accessfonbet.com, the site of the foreign betting company Fonbet, Evgenia Sukhovey, adviser to the media relations department of the Federal Tax Service. Since October 2015, amendments have been made to Federal Law No. 244 “On Gambling” and Federal Law No. 138 “On Lotteries”, which, in particular, gave the Federal Tax Service the authority to send instructions to Roskomnadzor to block illegal sites. After Google complied with the requirement of the law, its site was removed from the register of prohibited information, said Ampelonsky.

Technical moment

Experts interviewed by RBC draw attention to the fact that the incident occurred due to the fact that not a direct link to a prohibited resource was entered in the registry, but a redirect leading to it from google.ru. Such an address appears, for example, if you right-click on the site in the Chrome browser on the search results page and select the “copy link address” option from the drop-down menu, said David Homak, an Internet researcher and founder of the popular Lurkmore portal. The Federal Tax Service sent this link to Roskomnadzor, and thus the domain name google.ru appeared in the registry.

“The Federal Tax Service didn’t even click and didn’t look at what kind of site they were blocking. Well, and, accordingly, no one in Roskomnadzor checked what URL they were sent for, ”Khomak believes. - No one checks what exactly they are trying to block, and no one is responsible for the result. And providers are forced to comply with any, even obviously absurd requirements and fined for refusing to comply with these requirements.

However, getting into the registry does not mean automatic blocking of the site. Some "critical resources" may be on the prohibited list, but still be available. In particular, individual Wikipedia pages have been there since 2012, but the resource itself is available, says Artem Kozlyuk, head of the Roskomsvoboda project. The fact that Google was blocked only a year after it entered the registry can be explained precisely by this, the expert suggests.

It turned out to be inaccessible to some users on Thursday afternoon, said the Cybersecurity Telegram channel, which is run by political activist Alexander Litreev. He cites numerous user complaints. Roskomnadzor added it to the list of sites banned in Russia back in 2016, it follows from the data of the universal service for checking access restrictions to sites. It states that the address was entered into the register at the request of the Federal Tax Service. Correspondents of Vedomosti have opened the google.ru website.

The problem was, this is not a false block, the head of Roskomnadzor Alexander Zharov confirmed to Vedomosti. Google had a redirect to the site of the betting company, so the operators began to block it. Google has already removed the redirect, the problem was quickly resolved, Zharov explained.

The Federal Tax Service described several addresses (URLs) to block the site of this company, including an address that looked like a redirect link from Google, said Vadim Ampelonsky, a representative of Roskomnadzor. Roskomnadzor had no right not to include this link in the register, but immediately warned Google. The company removed the redirect, and Google was removed from the registry. According to Ampelonsky, this link was present in the registry for less than an hour.

“We are aware that some users are experiencing problems accessing the Google.ru website. There are no technical problems on Google's side. We're looking into the situation," a Google spokesperson said.

Google - a victim of the Federal Tax Service and Roskomnadzor?

The temporary blocking of Google could be the result of the systematic actions of the Federal Tax Service, which does not check which sites it sends for blocking, and, at the same time, a certain failure in the operation of the Roskomnadzor registry, says Artem Kozlyuk, head of the Roskomsvoboda project. After all, back in June 2016, the entire google.ru domain was included in the private part of the registry, in which links are entered not to block, but to warn site owners that their resources contain some prohibited content. It is possible that a failure in the system could send a number of Internet resources to be blocked - and not only www.google.ru, suggests Kozlyuk. If you believe the version of Roskomnadzor, then someone could complain about the site to the Federal Tax Service and throw a link with a Google redirect, but the Federal Tax Service and Roskomnadzor still had to check it. An example of such a “redirect” is the Google Translate service, with which you can access, among other things, blocked sites, since the translator’s “engine” uses the technical resources of Google itself to simultaneously translate the entire site. And if you send such a link to block, then, again, the whole Google will suffer.

The Federal Tax Service has the right to pre-trially require Roskomnadzor to block sites since 2015. We are talking about sites that violate the laws in the field of gambling and lotteries. Last July, Izvestia, citing data from the Federal Tax Service, reported that at the request of this service, Roskomnadzor blocked more than 6,000 online casinos and betting sites, as well as about 50 mobile applications of such companies. The sites were blocked because the creators of the sites and applications did not receive a special state license as an organizer of gambling.

Block history

This is not the first blocking scandal. In early June, some of the resources that were not blacklisted by Roskomnadzor were blocked, and this happened due to a vulnerability in the blocking system: it allows you to attach the IP address of a respectable resource to a banned address. Among those blocked were the Ivi Internet cinema, the hosting control panel in the user account of the Selectel hosting provider, and the Meduza website.

Russia began blocking websites with prohibited information in 2012, when the first law was passed to ban access to resources with child porn, suicide calls, and drug propaganda. Access to such sites is closed without a court decision, all of them are entered into the Roskomnadzor register, from which telecom operators take information about what needs to be blocked. Later, sites with extremist and generally any information prohibited by law began to be blocked. Then the blocks were extended to sites with pirated content, but in this case a court decision is required.

The Russian-language version of the Google site was temporarily included in the register of banned sites compiled by om. This has led some providers to close access to the popular search engine, to which social media users have complained.

In the black list google.ru was based on the decision of the Federal Tax Service () more than a year ago.

“We are aware that some users are experiencing problems accessing the google.ru website. There are no technical problems on Google's side. We're looking into the situation," a Google spokesperson said.

Google failed advertising

The blocking problem has now been resolved - more on that » Interfax"said the head of Roskomnadzor Alexander. “The problem was, this is not a false block. Google had a redirect from the site of the betting company, so the operators began to block it. Google has already removed the redirect, the problem was quickly resolved, ”said the head of the supervisory agency.

It turned out that the site google.ru was entered into the register on the basis of Art. 15.1 (on information, information technologies and information protection) by decision of the Federal Tax Service of June 14, 2016.

The Telegram channel "Sibersecurity and Co.", which is run by IT specialist Alexander Litreev, reported that Google "managed" to block in Russia, Telecom TZ, Science and Communications, Maxima Telecom, TTK, Stalnet, "Signal", "MaryinoNet" and about a dozen other providers. Litreev himself spent investigation and found out why Google got into the registry because of gambling sites.

According to the expert, the point is not the found vulnerability of the system, but the incompetence of the employees who contributed the site with prohibited information - instead of a direct link, the service address of the search engine advertising network was added to the list.

“Voila, the RKN killed Google for a huge number of Russians,” writes Litreev.

“This is just incompetence - people do not understand anything about how search engine advertising networks like Yandex.Direct and Google AdWords work,” the analyst added.

Gazeta.Ru contacted the director (IRI) for project activities to find out if Roskomnadzor has, in principle, reason to block Google. The expert confirmed that the reason for entering the search engine in the registry can only be a mistake or misunderstanding.

“Despite various scandalous initiatives in the field of Internet regulation, Russia is confidently moving along the path of free movement and exchange of information, access to legal sources of its distribution, which is the Google search service. Any restrictions introduced in our country are minimal and are caused by ensuring national security: countering the spread of illegal content, terrorism and extremism. Blocking Google in this situation would be barbaric, ”said the interlocutor of Gazeta.Ru.

Banned on google

Despite a fairly prompt solution to the problem, the news about the blocking of Google instantly spread across social networks, causing a huge number of publications. Many noted that the phrase “what, they banned you in Google” sparkled with new colors.

In addition, users joked about the fact that Roskomnadzor cannot remove Google from the register of banned sites, because now it cannot “google” how to do it.

Some also commented that Google's blocking should make employees very happy.

In general, the blocking of Google.ru came as a complete surprise to everyone, since Roskomnadzor did not make any statements about the existence of violations. The situation is completely different with the Telegram messenger, which Zharov’s department has long been trying to enter into the register of organizers of the dissemination of information, which means getting the necessary identifiers from it.

Telegram and its creator do not make contact with Roskomnadzor and do not respond to its requests, which led to the fact that the head of the department promised to personally demand the necessary data. Zharov added that he was “waiting, waiting for an answer from the messenger,” but has not yet achieved any result.

On Thursday afternoon, Russian ISPs began blocking access to the google.ru website. Information about the blocking of the RNS agency by several Internet operators at once: TTK, MaryinoNet, Science and Communications, Maxima Telecom and Avax. According to representatives of the companies, the restriction of access is connected with the decision of Roskomnadzor, which entered one of the IP addresses owned by Google into the register of prohibited resources.

At the same time, a message appeared on the website of the universal service to check the restriction of access to sites stating that google.ru was included in the Unified Register of Blocked Sites in June 2016 by decision of the Federal Tax Service.

“We are aware that some users are experiencing problems accessing the Google.ru website. There are no technical problems on Google's side. We understand the situation,” Svetlana Anurova, a representative of Google in Russia, told Novaya Gazeta.

Roskomnadzor spokesman Vadim Ampelonsky learned about the blocking of google.ru from journalists who turned to him for clarification. Some time later, already the head of the department, Alexander Zharov, told Vedomosti that “Google had a redirect from the website of the betting company,” so the operators began to block it.

According to him, Google has already removed the redirect, the problem has been solved. Later, Roskomnadzor removed the google.ru address from the registry.

According to the head of the Roskomsvoboda movement, Artem Kozlyuk, the situation is strange and continues to be strange, despite the statement by the head of Roskomnadzor that it has been resolved.

The Federal Tax Service entered www.google.ru into the register of banned sites. Recently, the tax service has been able to make decisions to block online gambling resources: poker, casinos, sweepstakes, etc.

“And the Federal Tax Service immediately became an active player in the Internet blocking market, overtaking many departments at once. And he brings in everything indiscriminately, including all sorts of technical domains that are not directly related to such sites, but through which some engines can be processed, and so on. Zharov does not quite transparently explain that there was some kind of redirect from the gambling site. What this means is not clear, here is a question for him, ”explains Kozlyuk.

This usually happens as follows: a government agency (for example, a tax authority) makes a decision, which is added to the private part of the register. The RKN then sends notifications to the hoster or site owner, giving them a few days to fix the violations. If the information is not deleted, then the RKN transfers this site to the open part of the registry, that is, to upload to telecom operators for blocking.

According to Kozlyuk, this is a routine procedure, but in some cases, some resources hang there for years. For example, some Wikipedia pages were added there back in 2012, and are still there, also with some Vkontakte links.

“Only the RKN can see this closed part, and it’s not clear why he keeps them there,” he notes.

In this case, Roskomnadzor acted as the executor of the decision, but as an executor, he admitted that www.google.ru was in the register of banned sites.

“And it so happened that the site from the closed part due to the fault of some particular artist - someone pressed the button or the code failed - suddenly got into the open part. Perhaps, along with it there were other resources. Telecom operators essentially received instructions from Roskomnadzor to block google.ru, while the RKN itself does not know about it. It's just his denial. It most likely happened by accident. We can just make such assumptions,” Kozlyuk added.

What happened before

In early June, due to a similar problem, users were unable to access some sites, including the Ivi online cinema and the Meduza publication. Roskomnadzor's blocking mechanism works by domain names (Domain Name System - DNS), the owner of a blocked site can bind any IP addresses to his resource in the domain name database. For those providers that did not provide for this vulnerability, access to allowed sites was automatically blocked.

Later, on June 9, there were interruptions in the work of some banks. In particular, payment terminals of Sberbank did not work, clients of other banks complained about failures when paying with cards. The author of the Cybersecurity and Co. Telegram channel, Alexander Litreev, published a list of hundreds of IP addresses that could be used to block bank addresses.

After that, the regional departments of Roskomnadzor asked providers not to use the domain name database (DNS resolving) when blocking. The Telegram channel Cybersecurity and Co published a letter from the department in the Urals Federal District. “Until June 16, 2017, it is necessary to limit access to Internet resources only to those IP addresses that are specified in the Registry (do not perform DNS resolution),” the document says.

“Tactically speaking, this is a mistake in the actions of Roskomnadzor. If strategically, then this is just another hole - of which there have already been many before - in the mental system of restricting access to information in general, and in Russia in particular. The oversight agency and legislators keep talking about these problems, but no one listens to the IT industry. This system is full of holes and cannot continue to be patched up with patches from the law. Nothing can close these holes, because there is no efficiency in restrictions. And what is happening now will stick out even more over time, and grow like a snowball, ”Kozlyuk believes.

Prohibited sites of Roskomnadzor. The register says that this happened on June 14 last year. According to preliminary data, it was the address www.google.ru that got blocked, while other addresses of the service, including those in the .com domain zone, open normally.

So far (15:00 Moscow time), Roskomnadzor has not made any comments on this matter.

Why providers started blocking the Russian Google domain right now is not clear. It is possible that some error has occurred.

02.

03.

"It looks like www.google.ru has been added to the Roskomnadzor registry. On the registry website (https://eais.rkn.gov.ru), the www.google.ru domain is really listed, and access is "restricted to the page"<...>

www.google.ru has been entered into the registry, but it does not open for a huge number of telecom operators. At the moment, problems are known for MTS, Telecom TZ, Nauka i Svyaz, Maxima Telecom, TTK, Stalnet, Signal, MaryinoNet and about a dozen other providers."

Telegram channel "Cybersecurity and Co."

The Moscow Internet provider Avaks blocked Google.ru, the company's clients told RNS and confirmed in technical support.

"Access to the page is prohibited, as it was included in the unified register of banned sites containing information whose distribution is prohibited in the Russian Federation, or in the federal list of extremist materials on the website of the Ministry of Justice," reads a message to Avax customers when trying to open Google .

According to a technical support representative, the blocking is related to the decision of Roskomnadzor, which entered one of the IP addresses owned by Google into the register of prohibited resources.

"This is a temporary phenomenon, Roskomnadzor has blocked it, we cannot influence it in any way, we have to wait. Roskomnadzor blocked some sites, they indicated Google's IP for this site, thus, as if avenging the blocking of their site. Because of this error in the Roskomnadzor system, it turns out that some people are not getting access to Google," the provider's tech support told RNS.

A company representative noted that such a situation has already developed with the Apple website. According to him, at the moment, "not all, but many providers are facing the problem of access to Google<...>

The representative of Roskomnadzor Vadim Ampelonsky noted that he had learned about the problem from journalists and would provide a comment later.

RNS

Google had a redirect from the site of the betting company, so the operators began to block it. Google has already removed the redirect, the problem was quickly resolved, Zharov explained.

About what pages and materials in question, it is not clear. A Google spokesperson promised to comment later.

"Vedomosti"

The address www.google.ru has disappeared from the register of Roskomnadzor.