MOSCOW, May 13 (RAPSI) – The Russia’s Coordination Center for Country Code Name administering domain zones .ru and .рф will vest the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor) with the right to request that domains used for promotion of drug consumption or dissimilation of extremist materials be de-delegated, Izvestiya newspaper reports on Friday.

This decision will be taken at the end of May, the Head of the Coordination Center has told the newspaper; the official spokesperson for Roskomnadzor has informed Izvestiya that at the moment the agency targets about 800 web sites.

In Russia, only courts may rule Internet content illegal. However, government agencies (Interior Ministry and Prosecutor General’s Office) and non-governmental organizations, with which the Coordination Center has made special agreements, have an opportunity to demand de-delegation of domains.

Under respective agreements, the Coordination Center entitles NGOs to define content as harmful and vests them with the competence to request de-delegation of domains publishing such content. At the moment there are four such NGOs: Kaspersky Lab, Group-IB,  Regional (Russian) Center for Internet Technologies (ROTsIT), and Safe Internet League.

At the end of May, Roskomnadzor will obtain the status of such “competent organization,” according to the Head of the Coordination Center, who has informed Izvestiya about a conference of host-providers and registrars organized in order to adopt the respective decision.