The Oktyabrsky District Court of Tomsk sentenced a local resident to three years of restriction of freedom for using the Bulgarian instant messenger VIPole under Art. 273 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (use of malicious computer programs). This is reported by the project "Network Freedom".
According to the investigation, from 2018 to 2020, the defendant regularly used "malicious computer software", realizing that this "will lead to the neutralization of the means of protecting computer information of providers."
Since the accused pleaded guilty, his case was considered in a special order.
“Nothing special, except for not very wide distribution in Russia, the messenger is no different. The wording used by the court in the verdict makes it possible to accuse any user of WhatsApp, Telegram, Viber, XMPP and many other applications under Article 273 of the Criminal Code,” Network Freedom notes.
Earlier, RIA Novosti, citing RTM Group experts, reported that correspondence in messengers is becoming key evidence in almost 20% of criminal cases heard in Russian courts.
It is noted that these are criminal cases on the sale of drugs, bribery or extortion. Messenger messages are also widely used as evidence in civil – especially family – disputes.