Sochi bloggers stage protest against attacks on local websites

An action was held today in front of Sochi city administration in protest against DDOS-attacks on local public Internet resources. The protesters taped their mouths with stickers "Censorship" and held laptops in their hands with crossed inscription "Freedom of speech" on the monitors.

According to the picketers - bloggers and civil activists - they tried to protest against restriction of their right to legally receive and disseminate information.

"After a tense situation has onset around the Sochi Branch of the Russian Geographic Society (RGS) in the context of attempts to deprive it of its legal status, the website of the branch geo.opensochi.org was subject to DDOS-attacks," said Yulia Naberezhnaya, Deputy Scientific Secretary of the Sochi Branch of the RGS.

Over the last few days, several other resources, which cover the activities of civil society in Sochi, were attacked, including the "Sochi News" (sochinskie-novosti.ru), "Hello Sochi" (privetsochi.ru) and "Sochi Blog" (blogsochi.ru). All the three resources are currently either unacceptable or acceptable with interruptions.

Administrators of these websites associate the attacks with their critical publications about the preparation for the Sochi Olympics; uncontrolled, in their opinion, construction and destruction of green areas; violations of workers' rights on construction sites, lack of transparency at resettlement, restricted elections and other problems.

The protest was not coordinated with the authorities, but policemen did not detain anyone - just had a talk with the organizers of the event.

Later, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent learned that one of the initiators of the action was invited to the Sochi UVD (Interior Department) for a talk.