And l ast week the Kostroma regional office of Roskomnadzor-a government body that oversees the media and internet-coached local journalists on how to cover sensitive topics such as drugs, suicide, and insults to the authorities, according to the news site Mediazona. In April, a man was fined $470 after calling Putin “an unbelievable fuckwit,” in violation of a new law against insulting the authorities. Last year, authorities cancelled the shows of dozens of Russian rappers and hip-hop artists to supposedly protect youths from immoral content. In a statement issued at the time and reported by TechCrunch, LinkedIn it believed it had complied with all applicable Russian laws, but the company had been unable to reach an understanding with Roskomnadzor to have the ban lifted. In 2016, the networking site LinkedIn was blocked in Russia for refusing to store the data of Russian users in the country. Tinder isn’t the first Western tech company to face scrutiny from Roskomnadzor, which has taken on an increasingly powerful censorship role in recent years. If a man throws himself in front of a train, the journalists were told to report that the man was “accidentally hit by a train.” Since detailed reporting on suicide methods is banned in Russia, journalists were handed a cheat sheet on how to stay on the right side of the law. And last week the Kostroma regional office of Roskomnadzor-a government body that oversees the media and internet-coached local journalists on how to cover sensitive topics such as drugs, suicide, and insults to the authorities, according to the news site Mediazona.
The announcement this week that Russian authorities had asked the dating app Tinder to hand over photos and messages exchanged by Russian users is just the latest step in a sweeping clampdown on free speech in the country by President Vladimir Putin-one that has taken a turn for the absurd lately.