Russian court fines man for searching for 'extremist materials' online

By Elena Teslova

MOSCOW (AA) - In a landmark ruling, a court in Russia’s Sverdlovsk region fined a local resident Wednesday for the act of searching for "extremist materials" online, marking the first known case in which merely looking for such content has been treated as a punishable offense.

The Kamensk-Uralsky City Court found the man, Sergei Glukhykh, guilty of violating Article 13.53 of the Administrative Code, which prohibits “searching for knowingly extremist materials and gaining access to them.”

According to the court’s press service, Glukhykh used his phone while on a bus in September to access materials listed on the Russian Ministry of Justice’s official registry of extremist content.

The case sets a significant precedent in Russian legal practice, effectively criminalizing the act of searching for certain state-defined information, regardless of whether it is downloaded, shared, or stored.