Russian Officials Consider Ban On Wi-Fi Use For Kids

dsinc writes that Russia's "Communications and Press Ministry has proposed banning children from using Wi-Fi networks in public, potentially making cafes, restaurants and other locations providing the service responsible for enforcing the law. An official with the ministry's Federal Mass Media Inspection Service, known as Roskomnadzor, said the ban should apply to people under 18 years old. Locations providing Wi-Fi access would be held legally responsible for implementing the rule, and failing to meet the proposed measure would result in a fine ranging from 20,000 rubles to 50,000 rubles ($640 to $1,600), Vedomosti reported Thursday." The law, ostensibly to "shield" children, would apply to a fairly broad definition of child — anyone under 18.

Re:What's the fear?

[tdrak]

at home is fine, they can track who and what was posted. In public is where they have the problem tracking who did the posting.

Re:What's the fear?

[ScottyLad]

I imagine they have the same problems we have of limited bandwidth and those darn kids are using it all up making internet access slow for everyone. Get them off the network (under some pretense of "think of the children") and - yay! More bandwidth for me...

Actually, one of the many things I like about Moscow and St Petersburg is the presence of a decent free wifi in almost every place you can buy a coffee (such as Coffee House in the picture, and Shokoladnitsi mentioned in the article). Plus the fact there are no annoying splash screens, proxy logins or registration required - just select the access point and browse away.

I tried to use the "free WiFi" in a McDonalds in the UK today as I had a poor mobile reception - I selected their access point, was prompted for my cellphone number, and then redirected to a login page which required the code which never arrived via SMS to my cellphone. It would be a real shame if the much more user-friendly and useful service in Russia (ie. one that actually works!) is legislated out of existence. (although the likelyhood of such legislation ever being enforced is another matter)

It's been a while since I've been over to the USA, so can't comment on the situation there, but there are certainly things that Russia does better than the UK - and public WiFi is one of them. Bookstores that open through the night is another. I'll be glad to be back in Moscow later this week.