Stories from RuNet Echo from March, 2011
Russia: “iPad 2 Smuggling in Full Blossom”
Profy writes about the attempts to smuggle iPad 2 into Russia.
Russia: The Most Fierce DDOS Attack On LiveJournal Analyzed
Ilya Dronov, LiveJournal's head of development, told [ru] some details about yesterday's DDOS-attack on LiveJournal, popular blogging platform in Russia. That was the most fierce attack in the history of the platform. Anton Nosik, suggested [ru] that (despite that most of the attacking machines were outside of Russia) the main client...
Russia: Voting For The BOBs Blog Award Has Started
On march 22, 2011 voting for "The Best Of Blogs" Awards, event annually organized by German media corporation Deutsche Welle, started. The award is getting more popular every year. This happens mostly because the role of blogs and online communities grows, as does their influence on social life.
Russia: Online Media 2010-2011 According to Yandex.ru
New Yandex.ru report "Media sphere of RuNet. September 2010 - January 2011" suggests that Russian online media are growing but still have a long way to go to become a truly developed reporting platform.
Russia: Mapping Bribery Online
Anton Nosik shares [ru] a link to RosKomVzyatka (‘Russian Committee for Bribes’), Ushahidi-based platform that allows users to map bribes (both given and taken) anonymously. It's another transparency project after rospil.info, gdecasino.ru, otmenta.ru, and others that crowdsource crime/injustice reporting.
Russia: Real Life Super Hero From Chelyabinsk
Metkere.com shares [ru] a video-address of a real life super hero calling himself “The Avenger.” (see his Vkontakte fan group [ru]) The avenger, a man in a black costume with a green letter “M” (apparently M for Mstitel’, the ‘avenger’ in Russian) on it and a black mask, says he...
Russia: Blogger Translates Articles on Alexey Navalny
LJ user vadda translates from English into Russian two recent texts about Alexey Navalny, a prominent Russian anti-corruption activist: one text, by Andrew E. Kramer, appeared in the New York Times on March 27 (the Russian translation is here; 266 comments); the other, by Julia Ioffe, was published in the...
Russia: A Riot Police Officer's Twitter and Blog
A Good Treaty writes about an anonymous Moscow riot police (OMON) officer, who started tweeting in January (@OMON_Moscow, RUS, over 3,000 followers) and also has a blog (LJ user omon-moscow, RUS): “While the fact that this blogging activity is tolerated by the police force likely constitutes evidence that the top...
Russia: 2010 Cyber-Crime Market Research
Group IB, Russian cyber-security research company, publishes [ru] Russian Cyber-Crime Market in 2010 report. According to the research, Russian hackers commit nearly 35 percent of all cyber-crimes. DDOS-attacks (from $90 to $300 per day of attack) are falling in price which makes this method of cyber-warfare more accessible to online...
Russia: Voina Art Collective
At OpenDemocracy.net, writes about the Voina art collective (RUS: @free_voina; ENG: @free_voina_en) and “explains how their controversial methods have made it difficult to mobilise support.” Kevin Rothrock (@agoodtreaty) re-posts a video of Voina‘s recent prank action (1,178,969 views, 3,023 likes, 658 dislikes): “unwelcomely, without warning kiss female cops on candid...
Russia: Unexpected Results of Radiation Mapping
The crowdsourcing project of mapping radiation levels in Russia measured by private dosimeters not only became an interesting case of digital activism, but also showed some effects its creators didn’t even think of.
Russia: Life of Migrant Workers in Pictures
Photoblogger zyalt publsed a selection of pictures on the life of migrant workers in Russia. The pictures with English captions are re-posted by English Rusia here.
Russia: Friendship Relations Between LiveJournal Blogs Analyzed
Habrahabr-user RomanL published [ru] a detailed analysis of Russian LiveJournal blogs. According to the analysis, Russian-speaking LiveJournal blogosphere (active audience of around 170,000 users) can be divided into 4 distinctive clusters (apolitical, political, creative, and general). Only 55 bloggers have the audience of more than 10,000 friends, while the vast...
Russia: Bots To Look For Extremism Online
Lenta.ru reported that Roskomnadzor, Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Communication, intends to use a special software designed to spot extremist content online. The software will check text, audio and video footage on the Web for words and phrases containing calls for violence and social and...
Russia: Human Bots Fight Opposition
As Internet control becomes more and more sophisticated, new techniques join the arsenal of online deception and discreditation. Vadim Isakov analyzed the phenomena of 'human bots,' paid commenters willing to turn any constructive conversation into the mess.
Russia: First Candidates for the ‘Net Parliament’
Novaya Gazeta website publishes [ru] the first results of the nominations for the ‘Net Parliament,’ the virtual project described by its creators as an ‘organ of the representative power of Russian Internet.’ Among the first hundred of the nominated candidates are mostly Moscow-based bloggers.
Russia: Photos of Saint Patrick's Day Parade in Moscow
Photoblogger Dervishv publishes [ru] extravagant photos of Saint Patrick's Day celebration: all kinds of green, Moscow hipsters, Irish flags… and police (the parade was officially banned). At least, some parts of the police forces were in green uniform.
Russia: Reaching Out to the President
Many projects have been recently created in Russia on the basis of crowdsourcing (or user-generated content (UGC)), when information on any particular topic is collected by internet users. Almost each one of these projects signalizes about a problem. Marina Litvinovich analyzed them and proposed a thesis that the success of these projects depends on their ability to establish their contact with the officials.
Russia: 80 Million of Russians to Go Online by 2014
Given current online trends in Russia, the Internet penetration in the country in 2014 will be as high as 71 percent with 80 million of Russians using the Web, the latest report [RUS] of the Public Opinion Foundation said.
Russia: New Website Fights Corruption in Moscow University
New website MGIMOleaks.com is designed to fight corruption at prestigious Moscow State University of International Relations. People are urged to inform the site administration about any cases of bribery, scams, abuse of powers, etc. The information will then be published on the site and given anonymously to the police.
Russia: Tweets From State Duma “Internet Law” Hearing
Inna Smbatyan, analyst at “Social Networks” Agency, tweets [ru] from the Russian State Duma “Internet Law” hearing. The draft of the law that would regulate online activity in Russia can be found here [ru].
