Hello.
I heard in an internal discussion of one of the projects of a large company: “Colleagues, let’s not limit ourselves, there is no need to prohibit anything, we are not deputies.” An accurate observation that is difficult to argue with, the words “limit”, “prohibit”, “slow down”, “block” are constantly heard in the media space. I wasn’t too lazy and looked for something creative, but either my vision is blurred, or there isn’t very much of this creativity. At the highest level, problems, threats and our reaction to everything are discussed at such a time. It confuses me somewhat that they are trying to explain to me what the correct reaction is and why it is the only correct one. But I’m grumbling a little, I just don’t like the number of prohibitions that arise every day.
Most recently, we discussed a possible change for spam calls on regular networks; the proposal came from the Ministry of Digital Development. And we discussed as widely as possible its likely implementation in practice, the impact on the market and operators.
The topic of scammers is gradually fading away; we have learned to deal with such calls and have squeezed them out into instant messengers. And then there were discussions that it would be a good idea to limit calls from scammers through these applications in order to certainly protect everyone without exception. Many people liked the idea, for example, the head of Roskomnadzor Andrei Lipov said at the Spectr forum, which is currently taking place in Sochi, that the agency “can limit calls through instant messengers.” Here and below are quotes from RBC, source here.
According to Andrey Lipov, “the messenger will have to enable a citizen to independently restrict the receipt of certain calls: from abroad or not from his address book”and also “relatively speaking, until you have fulfilled this, they will not be able to call through you. This is a separate regulation that needs to be thought through. It will be further discussed on the sidelines of the forum.”.
The news is not new; in the summer, Roskomnadzor already announced the need to check the phone numbers of Russian messenger users, and as a restriction measure they proposed limiting calls for all messengers that refuse to transfer data about their users. The head of the department for control and supervision in the field of communications of Roskomnadzor, Maxim Prytkin, said the following in the summer: “We believe that for those messengers that refuse to check the authenticity of numbers together with telecom operators, measures may be taken to prohibit voice calls made through them in our country.”.
Let me start with the fact that messengers cannot and do not want to transmit information about their users in this form, for example, for Whatsapp* there is no such mechanism at all (*owned by Meta, recognized as an extremist organization in Russia).
It is important to understand that the requirement to limit calls is not an isolated one, that is, first there is a desire to get a phone number linked to a nickname in the same Telegram, that is, to make sure that there are no anonymous channels as such. It’s a utopia, but people are working and trying to do something in this area (we remember the registration of bloggers with 10 thousand subscribers, restrictions on advertising in their channels or retweets – registered channels must hang a special label, where to hang it is unclear. And for the media, everything it doesn’t work, but who knows?).
It is almost impossible to fulfill the wishes of the RKN in real life; we remember that Discord, after blocking, deleted the pages to which there were complaints, but did not receive an unblocking. RKN prudently does not share the list of pages to which they have complaints, and this is also sad, we always take our word for it that there is something like that there. Considering that the department often sends requests for the removal of information that does not violate anything, and starting next year there are even forbidden words that cannot be used in any way, this all looks like clumsy and not very smart censorship. Crossing out a huge chunk of technology that is useful and necessary just because someone uses it to access information looks like a very strange decision. It weakens us as a country and it is a detrimental action.
Let’s figure out what the ban on voice calls through instant messengers will affect. Within Russia we can use regular communications for calls, most tariffs have a sufficient number of minutes, there is no problem here. There is no big load on the networks here, except for the fact that as part of obligations to the state (Yarovaya), such calls will need to be stored (calls themselves through messengers are not stored in any way, since it is impossible to isolate this traffic, and the messengers refused to transfer this data. In total, we will have to will be spent on a certain number of racks in data centers, which will place an additional burden on the shoulders of operators. Another straw among the thousands that the state burdens operators. The rhetoric here is always the same – it’s security, look how much it will cost you, pennies. against the backdrop of your income. But these pennies add up to full-fledged streams and there is nothing good here.
Can RKN block calls via instant messengers? The way they are organized today, such blocking is possible and relatively easy to implement. The question, of course, is how much it is possible to load the TSPU with all the rules for blocking everything and everyone, since the equipment tends to run out and simply can no longer handle such an extensive list of blocking various protocols, services, and sites. It’s funny, but RKN will soon have to choose which evil is worse, since they won’t be able to block all threats, the equipment’s performance is not enough. There will be new purchases in the coming years; the department has requested almost 50 billion rubles of budget money to expand its capabilities.
Can instant messengers make life more difficult for RCNs and change the way they make calls online? Yes, they can and with a high probability they will do it. What will be the next step for RKN? It is well known and has already been tested in practice; it is possible to lose a number of packets for the user in a user channel, which is guaranteed to interrupt voice communication, but does not affect video streaming, file downloading, and so on.
But there is a problem here too. In addition to voice calls, all online games that require team play and a good connection will be broken, eSports can be forgotten, Russian players will receive worse conditions and this is bad. Considering how much attention the state pays to this area, many questions arise: do we really want this?
But the most interesting thing is that our mobile communications are inevitably degraded; one of the solutions is VoLTE/VoWiFi, which partially relieves operator networks. When we block calls in instant messengers, we will also block such calls through operator networks. Or it will be necessary to create a very expensive system that will know where the legitimate calls of operators are and where everyone else is. There are more questions than answers, but we do not have such a system, and it is not expected in the near future. But we know how to block messengers.
We can safely say that messengers will not comply with the requirements of the RKN, since this is an additional cost for them; in a crisis they do not have the money for this. And they don’t care much whether people in Russia are able to make calls or not, this is an additional opportunity to attract customers, but there is no monetization as such.
For you and me, when traveling abroad, it will become more expensive and difficult to call home, since it is precisely such calls that the RKN in Russia will fight against. But again, the number of requirements for messengers is such that it is impossible to comply with them. This will revive operator applications for calls, perhaps make Russian instant messengers popular, which will be installed during the trip (transferring communication there is, to put it mildly, a pipe dream, this will definitely not happen).
From everything that is happening, I have a simple feeling that we don’t have enough chaos, and we create it ourselves, without calculating the consequences of our actions. More prohibitions, good and different, that are aimed at our protection. After all, adults are so defenseless against scammers that we need to be protected at any cost, and at our own expense. I really want transparency in this matter, public discussions and debate, as we are rapidly approaching the moment when the number of prohibitions will exceed all reasonable limits and become too large. And we must clearly understand that this is money from our pockets, which is a burden on the economy, simply burned in attempts to protect us from a problem that was de facto solved by the market itself.
Source: mobile-review.com
