FACTBOX: A history of TASS

TASS FACTBOX. September 1, 2024 marks the 120th anniversary of TASS, Russia's leading government-run news agency. In this piece TASS FACTBOX editors look back on some landmark events in the agency’s history and give a glimpse of what the news outlet is like these days.

The Russian Empire’s SPTA, PTA

The St. Petersburg Telegraph Agency (SPTA) was the first in Russia to become a unified body for the dissemination of official information. It went on stream on September 1 (September 14, New Style), 1904. The agency emerged on the basis of the Trade and Telegraph Agency (TTA, 1903-1904) under the auspices of three government ministries - of foreign affairs, internal affairs and finance. Initially, the SPTA operated under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Finance. It reported "political, financial, economic, trade and other information of public interest within the Empire and abroad". Its first CEO (in 1904-1906) was Pavel Miller, a prominent statesman of the Russian Empire and former director of the TTA. Overall administration was placed in the hands of a board of three directors - one representative from each of the three ministries concerned.

In its first year the SPTA cost the treasury 49,000 rubles - a cash equivalent of a large rural estate.

The agency functioned round the clock. It had a staff of about 70 employees, including 9 journalists. The subscribers (by 1917 there were 600 of them) received a news bulletin called Vestnik (Herald), no more than one thousand words per day in size. The content was exempt from censorship at the places of receipt. In 1906, a special machine for receiving SPTA messages was installed in St. Petersburg’s royal Winter Palace.

In 1909, at the suggestion of Russia’s Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin, a new Regulation specifying the SPTA’s status was drafted. Control of the agency was transferred from the Ministry of Finance to the Council of Ministers.

On August 19, 1914 the St. Petersburg Telegraph Agency was renamed to the Petrograd Telegraph Agency (PTA) following the change of the city's name.

After the October Revolution

On October 25 (November 7, New Style), 1917 the PTA office was taken over by a detachment of Baltic Fleet sailors. It was from its head office that the first reports of the revolutionary events in Russia were promptly transmitted to news agencies and dailies around the world.

On December 1, 1917 a decree signed by Vladimir Lenin, the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars (CPC) of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), declared the PTA as the central news outlet operating under the CPC. Leonid Stark was appointed the PTA’s first commissar.

In March 1918, together with the Russian government, the agency moved to Moscow. On September 7, the Presidium of the All-Russia Central Executive Committee (VTsIK) adopted a resolution to merge the PTA and the Press Bureau operating under the VTsIK. The Presidium ruled that "the new media should be called the Russian Telegraph Agency under the All-Russia Central Executive Committee, abbreviated as ROSTA in Russian."

By 1919, ROSTA had 42 bureaus across the country. Also, there were offices abroad: in Berlin, Tehran, Budapest, Vienna, Stockholm and Oslo.

ROSTA was publishing about 400 printed wall newspapers, its own daily called Agit-ROSTA and socio-political, economic, literary and illustrated magazines. The first journalism school in the country opened at the agency.

The years of foreign military intervention and the Civil War gave rise to a new visual form of awareness promotion and enlightenment of the general public - ROSTA Windows. Under this name, from September 1919 to January 1921, a series of satirical posters on burning issues of the day were released. Young artists, poets, and journalists, among them Vladimir Mayakovsky, made up the ROSTA Windows group of creative and enthusiastic avantgarde authors. In all, the ROSTA Windows team released an estimated 2,000 posters.

In 1922, ROSTA had 477 offices across the nation. On July 10, 1925, the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union established a central national news outlet, the Telegraph Agency of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Soviet TASS

TASS incorporated the news agencies of all union republics. At the same time, the local telegraph agencies of the Soviet republics could collect and disseminate information exclusively within their territories.

On March 30, 1934, the phrase "TASS is authorized to declare" was used for the first time. Frontpage columns in the national dailies Pravda and Izvestia denied speculations about the detention of Soviet spies in Paris (some covert details of that affair would surface only after the breakup of the Soviet Union). Subsequently, the opening "TASS is authorized..." was repeatedly used in official reports, statements and denials by the Soviet government.

The abbreviation TASS was perceived by many as the official voice of Moscow, and the cliche "TASS is authorized to declare" became iconic. In 1975, the agency was awarded the Order of the October Revolution, the second most important state decoration the Soviet Union after the Order of Lenin.

By 1988, the Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union had one of the largest correspondent networks in the world: 682 offices all over the country and 94 around the world. The agency provided information to radio and television editors, as well as to 4,000 Soviet dailies published in 64 languages. Their single circulation exceeded 190 million copies.

Over one thousand foreign news agencies, dailies, magazines, and television and radio broadcasters received TASS reports and photos. The international and national news agencies having access to TASS reports often shared them with their own readership, so it will not be an exaggeration to say that TASS content in one form or another appeared in all 8,200 daily newspapers of the world.

After 1991

After the proclamation of Russia's sovereignty, President Boris Yeltsin's decree of January 22, 1992, established the Information Telegraph Agency of Russia TASS (the abbreviation TASS was preserved as a globally recognized brand). On May 4, 1994, the Russian government confirmed its status as the country's central state news agency. The government of the Russian Federation is its founder.

In 1999, the agency was among the initiators of creating the World Association of Russian Press, the world's only association of Russian-language media.

On October 1, 2014, the agency regained its historical name - TASS. The abbreviation TASS has become a brand and is now not decoded.

TASS today

The Director-General of TASS is Andrey Kondrashov (since 2023). The Editor-in-Chief is Mikhail Petrov (since 2019).

The list of TASS subscribers includes Russian and foreign media, federal and regional government agencies, foreign diplomatic missions, non-governmental organizations and others. They have access to 70 news feeds and thematic services in all official UN languages - Russian, English, Arabic, Spanish, Chinese and French.

The TASS Media Bank boasts 55 million pieces of content, including about 1 million unique historical images from the early days of the 20th century and over 1 million stock photos and videos.

The agency maintains relations of partnership with more than 200 media outlets from 112 countries.

As of 2024, the agency has a total staff of more than 1,700. There are 64 bureaus in Russia's regions and 62 offices in 57 countries. TASS regional information centers operate in St. Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg and Pyatigorsk, and its press centers are located in Stavropol and Kaliningrad.

A TASS correspondent has been permanently present on the International Space Station (ISS) since 2021. Roscosmos cosmonauts on board the orbital outpost take turns in this capacity on the parttime basis.