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Freedom House experts believe that the Ukrainian authorities did not provide convincing arguments to block Russian social media in Ukraine.
The index of freedom in the Ukrainian segment of the Internet is around 61 out of 100, Ukraine according to this parameter it is “partially free”. This is stated in Freedom House’s Freedom Online 2020 report.
“The Ukrainian government continues to block a large number of websites and content of a certain type, citing their danger to society, without providing convincing arguments that blocking is the only effective and possible option,” says Matthew, director of the office of Freedom House in Ukraine. Schaaf.
He points out that during the entire time of implementation of the content blocking policy, there has been almost no state effort to educate and prepare Ukrainian citizens to become responsible and informed users of information and the Internet.
The report also highlighted that in September 2019, the Ukrainian government removed the license requirement for Internet service providers, reducing the potential risks of political interference and corruption in the information and communications technology sector.
At the same time, the Ukrainian authorities considered two bills that, according to the authors of the report, may have a negative impact on digital rights:
- the draft law on disinformation could potentially introduce liability for the deliberate dissemination of false information and allow the state to determine who is and who is not a journalist;
- A media bill registered in parliament in late 2019 could allow the state to shut down online posts to publish propaganda.
The authors also question the legality of the ban in Ukraine of Russian social networks VKontakte and Odnoklassniki. Freedom House also criticized the Diy Vdoma app for monitoring how people adhere to self-isolation. The report indicates that the application saves the location data of users and their digital snapshot, and the Ministry of the Interior and the National Police have access to this data.
Access to VKontakte, along with other Russian and separatist resources, has been restricted since May 2017 in accordance with presidential decree No. 133/2017, by which the then head of state Peter Poroshenko enacted the NSDC decision on sanctions against Russian and Ukrainian individuals and companies.
Also included in the sanctions list Odnoklassniki, Mail.Ru and Yandex services, websites of the Russian antivirus companies Kaspersky Lab and Doctor Web. In 2018 and 2019 changes were made to the document (decrees №176 / 2018 Y №82 / 2019).
On May 15, 2020, President Vladimir Zelensky extended the ban on Russian social media for another three years.
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