Kuban programmer creates software to trace extremists-newcomers

Ivan Shukshin, a programmer from the city of Gelendjik, has created a computer programme that tracks the updates to the list of extremists and terrorists, posted on the website of the "Rosfinmonitoring" (Russian Federal Financial Monitoring Service).

The software is checking, on the hourly basis, the "Rosfinmonitoring" page, which allows tracing, in real-time mode, entering of new names and other changes in the list, Ivan Shukshin, the creator of programme, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent on August 14.

According to his story, the idea of such a script appeared after the incident with Maria Motuznaya, a blogger from Barnaul, who was put on the list of extremists even before the trial.

Alexander Popkov, a lawyer of the human rights organization "Agora", told the "Caucasian Knot" that putting on the list represents a mechanism for pre-trial suppression of extremist or terrorist activities.

"This is one of the main problems in human rights activities, because the person has not yet been convicted, but already deprived of his/her rights in advance," Mr Popkov said.

"Of course, if a terrorist is financed, we can wait for the court judgement for several years; therefore, they have invented precautionary mechanisms; but, on the other hand, in our Russian realities, this is all extremely perverted. Extremism is a call for radical actions, but in our country they treat a person as extremist for a picture or a repost; it is not in line with the international law and the fight against terrorism," Alexander Popkov believes.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on August 15, 2018 at 05:01 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.