Russia has witnessed its first case brought by the federal customs service against a local resident for trying to order a smartphone from a foreign online store. Eugene Yarutkin, a resident of Dimitrovgrad (Ulyanovsk region), was given the dubious honor when he ordered a Motorola Moto G with a data encryption feature from a German online store in May 2014.
According to a law enacted in 2012, telecom equipment with an encryption function that is not certified by the FSB (Russia’s state security organization) is not to be imported to member countries of the Customs Union. According to the law, in cases of transgression fines imposed on consumers can range from 1,500 rubles ($47) to 2,500 rubles ($78). However, the law has rarely been enacted.
Yarutkin, who reviews Android products online, ordered and paid for the smartphone from the Computeruniverse.net e-commerce platform. Once the parcel arrived at the local branch of the Russian Post, Yarutkin was refused access to the delivery and was sent for further investigation to the customs service. He returned accompanied by customs officers and the parcel was opened, but access to the product was still denied due to the lack of a so-called “notification” document of authorization from the FSB.
Eventually, the unsatisfied customer received notice that Russian customs instituted administrative proceedings. He was given a document containing the following passage: “Cell phone Motorola XT1032 is a subscriber communication device with an encryption function, and falls under section 2.19 of the act on the restriction of imports and exports of encryption (cryptographic) devices from and to the Customs Union, as approved by the decision of the Board of the Eurasian Economic Commission from 16.08.2012 № 134.”
According to a blog by security expert Aleksey Lukatskiy, this was the first official case against a Russian citizen who ordered a mobile phone not certified for sale in Russia from a foreign online store. He adds that the same penalty may be applied to people that purchased a smartphone abroad and attempt to bring it to Russia by baggage or carry-on baggage. He also pointed out that the same legal rulings apply not only to the device itself, but also to all the software within it.
Source: CNews.ru
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