Telegram hopes to overcome the FSB of the Russian Federation in courts

The messenger challenged the decision on the legality of the FSB order and filed a complaint against the verdict of the Supreme Court.
08.05.2018
Kommersant
Origin source
Telegram Messenger LLP filed an appeal against the decision of the Supreme Court (Supreme Court), which recognized as legitimate the order of the Federal Security Service (FSB) to issue keys to decrypt user messages. Representatives of the messenger believe that the court decision was made "with a significant violation of the law", and the order itself contradicts a number of laws.

Telegram Messenger LLP filed an appeal against the decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation of March 20, 2018, said Pavel Chikov, head of the international human rights group "Agora" representing the interests of Telegram. Then the court recognized as legitimate the order of the FSB to decrypt the messages of Telegram and, thus, rejected the claim of the messenger created by Pavel Durov to the FSB.

According to the text of the appeal complaint published on the Agora website, the lawyer of the Telegram Messenger LLP asks to revoke the decision of the Supreme Court completely and to recognize the order of the FSB as ineffective and not in compliance with the laws On Information, On the Federal Security Service, on the Code of Criminal Procedure and on the laws " On Operative-Search Activity "," On Counteracting Corruption "," On Anti-Corruption Expertise of Regulatory Legal Acts and Draft Normative Legal Acts ". Respondents are the FSB, the Ministry of Justice, as well as the Prosecutor General's Office.

Protection Telegram focuses on three points.

Firstly, the contested order contradicts the criminal procedural legislation, lawyers of the "Agora" believe. Earlier, they reminded, the court considered that the information necessary for decoding electronic messages was not included in federal laws for information of limited access. But this conclusion is "wrong": Telegram provides personal correspondence between citizens. The number of users of the service is more than 100 million worldwide, of which about 6 million in Russia, it is stated in the complaint (earlier, however, Pavel Durov on his page in VKontakte reported that the user base of the messenger is 15 million).

"Taking into account the requirements of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (Article 8), as well as the provisions of the Constitution of the Russian Federation (Article 23), Telegram's professional responsibility is to ensure the inviolability of the private life of citizens," argue in the Agora. The provision of the keys would allow the FSB to monitor the correspondence of all Telegram users, and not only in the criminal proceedings for crimes of medium gravity, serious and particularly serious crimes on the basis of a judicial decision, as required by the law "On Operative-Investigative Activities" and the Criminal- procedural code of the Russian Federation.

Secondly, the order was adopted by an "unauthorized body with excess of authority and directly contradicts federal legislation," the representatives of Telegram believe. The only body that establishes the procedure for interaction between the organizers of the dissemination of information on the Internet with government agencies conducting operational search activities or providing security is the government, and not the FSB, lawyers write in the complaint.

Thirdly, the contested order contradicts the Federal Law "On Combating Corruption", believe in the "Agora". According to the representatives of Telegram, the order does not contain any requirements to the organizational and legal measures to ensure the secrecy of the information received. "The FSB, based on its own order, required the transfer (information on decoding.-" b ") through unprotected channels of communication (to the e-mail address [email protected]). This e-mail is indicated as a common contact address on the official website of the FSC. According to the information posted on the site, the e-mail address is one of the channels for citizens to apply to the service, for which it is forbidden (!) To transmit information of limited distribution, to which the information requested by the FSB for decrypting the correspondence between the users of Telegram, - lawyers pay attention.

Internet

Previous Article
Next article