The Moscow Arbitration Court rejected on Tuesday an appeal of Scotland-based company Private Networks demanding that Roskomnadzor, Russia's communications watchdog, unblock its virtual private network (VPN) service, which allowed individuals in Russia to access the blocked Telegram messenger service, a Sputnik correspondent reported from the court room.
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 18th September, 2018) The Moscow Arbitration Court rejected on Tuesday an appeal of Scotland-based company Private Networks demanding that Roskomnadzor, Russia's communications watchdog, unblock its virtual private network (VPN) service, which allowed individuals in Russia to access the blocked Telegram messenger service, a Sputnik correspondent reported from the court room.
"To completely refuse to satisfy the claims," the judge said announcing the court ruling.
The complainant demanded that court acknowledge that Roskomnadzor illegally blocked domain Names and network addresses of Private Networks's TgVPN internet service. Private Networks also urged the court to require that Roskomnadzor remove the domain names and network addresses from this blacklist.
VPN is a technology that provides encryption of transmitted traffic, allowing a user to hide personal data. The service is used, in particular, to bypass the blocking of certain Internet resources.
On April 13, a Moscow district court authorized Roskomnadzor to block Telegram, after the messenger refused to give encryption keys to the Russian security services amid concerns that the messenger could be used by terrorists or criminals.
In August, Telegram's lawyer Pavel Chikov said that the messenger had adjusted its confidentiality policy and agreed to provide information about terrorism suspects to the Russian intelligence services in accordance with the court's ruling.
