Russian Court Bans Information in Tor Browser App
The Leninsky District Court of Saratov, which was assigned to re-examine the case involving The Tor Project, partially granted the prosecutor’s claim and declared both the information contained in the Tor Browser application and the Tor Browser app itself to be prohibited.
To recap, in December 2021, Russia blocked the Tor Project website, public proxy servers (nodes), and certain bridges. Since the case was reviewed without representatives from The Tor Project Inc., lawyers from Roskomsvoboda appealed the decision. Last week, the Tor Project website was unblocked in Russia (comments from our lawyers on this can be found here). However, the case was sent back for reconsideration.
According to the court’s decision: “This decision serves as the basis for including the information contained in the Tor Browser application, the Tor Browser app itself, and the app as listed on the Google Play application page, in the Unified Register of domain names, website page pointers, and network addresses that allow identification of websites on the Internet containing information whose distribution is prohibited in the Russian Federation.”
During the new review, Google LLC was also involved in the case as an interested party.
“Initially, the prosecutor requested that Google be included as an interested party and made separate demands of the company, which was procedurally incorrect. The court corrected this on its own initiative, changing Google’s status from an interested party to a defendant and separated the demands to Google LLC to remove the app from the app store into a separate proceeding. However, the main decision still pointed out the illegal nature of the content on Google Play,” explained Ekaterina Abashina, a lawyer from Roskomsvoboda handling the case.
According to her, the court agreed with Roskomnadzor, which throughout the process insisted that information, the application, and the technology are all the same, and therefore all can be banned by court decision under Chapter 27.1 of the Code of Administrative Procedure of the Russian Federation (CAS RF). However, the very title of this chapter clearly states that it concerns cases about recognizing information as prohibited, not applications or technologies. The court’s decision does not specify what information in the Tor Browser app is prohibited or under which law.
Roskomsvoboda’s lawyers plan to file an appeal, arguing that access to the app cannot be restricted by court order. First, there are no regulations banning the operation of VPN apps, anonymizers, or similar tools that bypass blocks. Second, there is a specific procedure for restricting access to such services, but it does not provide for a general ban—only a process and conditions for blocking in case of violations. No such procedure was initiated for the Tor Browser app.
“We consider the decision completely unfounded. We would like to see predictable application of the ‘Information Law.’ Moreover, there is a special extrajudicial procedure for blocking anonymizer-type services, and Roskomnadzor can block the app itself under Article 15.8 of the Information Law. Believe it or not, VPN and anonymizer services are also blocked by order of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation or their deputies under Article 15.3. Now the court has taken on this function as well. So why was this special procedure for blocking VPN services under Article 15.8 introduced? That’s a rhetorical question,” Abashina concluded.