MOSCOW, September 14 (RAPSI) – The Russian Bar Association for Human Rights (RBAHR) believes it is necessary to introduce ownership rights as to social media accounts of authenticated users, the press service of the body informs RAPSI on Monday.

Recognition of ownership rights with respect to social media profiles for users who could prove their identities by producing passports or equivalent documents is the only logical solution permitting to protect the rights of owners; user profiles or pages are to be blocked only by court rulings, members of the Association observe.

According to the RBAHR press service, over the past two months a flow of complaints against blocking of social media profiles and pages users believe were unjustified has intensified; it especially concerns Facebook.

Chair of the Association Maria Arkhipova takes the view that owners of social networks need to understand that they produce public goods and have to bear the respective burden, first of all, to guarantee the rights to ownership of the content created by users, including their pages and profiles.

Digitalization has resulted in the fact that public goods produced on the internet are owned by a single person; it could be acceptable in the very beginning when technologies just started to develop; nevertheless, when technologies become public goods they should not be owned by a single person as in such a case it is a monopoly bringing with it respective negative externalities and abuses, Arkhipova stresses.