The Kremlin’s nervous reaction to May’s ‘March of the Millions’ on Bolotnaya Square, and uncertainty around a protest action planned for tomorrow have led many to suspect that the Russian government is looking seriously at using force to suppress opposition. Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan analy
In a previous article, Irina Borogan and Andrei Soldatov asked who was bugging the Russian opposition. Here they develop this theme, looking at how a combination of recent legislation and new technology has allowed Russia’s many security agencies to expand their activities still further.
In December 2011, Wikileaks released ‘Spy Files’, a project revealing details of the burgeoning surveillance and interception industry. The list of companies providing high-tech equipment to governments included a number of Russian firms, which are emerging as global leaders in the industry. Andre
President Medvedev has made much of Russia’s need for modernisation and advanced technology. One project piloted in some Moscow metro stations involves face recognition using biometric technology. This can clearly be used as protection against terrorism, but given that the organisation which commi
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