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Russia's telecom watchdog starts blocking Telegram messenger

The watchdog has received the court's ruling

© Alexandr Ryumin/TASS

MOSCOW, April 16. /TASS/. Russia’s telecom and media watchdog, the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media, has received the ruling by Moscow’s Tagansky District Court on restricting access to Telegram’s products in Russia. The watchdog’s press service reported on Monday that the operators had been sent information on curbing access to Telegram’s resources.

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"Roskomnadzor has received the ruling by the Tagansky District Court on restricting access in Russia to the web resources of the online information dissemination organizer, Telegram Messenger Limited Liability Partnership. In light of this, information on these online resources was sent to the operators on Monday, April 16, with regards to restricting access," the watchdog said.

On April 13, Moscow’s Tagansky District Court upheld the telecom watchdog’s motion to block access to the Telegram messenger in Russia for its failure to provide the keys to decrypt user messages to the Russian Federal Security Service, the FSB. Telegram said this demand was impossible to comply with technically, since the keys are stored on user devices.

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