Trends
Kremlin jails father of Russia’s Internet
OUR TAKE Soldatov, a nuclear physicist by training, began his career at the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy, the Soviet Union’s leading nuclear research facility during the Cold War. He was accused of abusing his power while managing a pool of ip addresses for an organization for which he had n…
Headline
OUR TAKE Soldatov, a nuclear physicist by training, began his career at the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy, the Soviet Union’s leading nuclear research facility during the Cold War. He was accused of abusing his power while managing a pool of ip addresses for an…
Context
OUR TAKE Soldatov, a nuclear physicist by training, began his career at the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy, the Soviet Union’s leading nuclear research facility during the Cold War. He was accused of abusing his power while managing a pool of ip addresses for an organization for which he had no position. This legal absurdity was enough to get him jailed, even if the court knew of Soldatov’s illness, meaning the court has no legal right to pass a custodial sentence. His family argued that the decision is essentially a death sentence. –Zora Lin, BTW reporter Russian Internet pioneer Alexey Soldatov , founder of the country’s first Internet service provider, has been sentenced by a court to two years of hard labor for “abuse of power.” Soldatov, 72, has been detained by a Moscow court. He has been terminally ill.
Evidence
Pending intelligence enrichment.
Analysis
Soldatov was accused of abusing his power while managing a pool of ip addresses for an organization for which he had no position. This legal absurdity was enough to get him jailed, even if the court knew of Soldatov’s illness, meaning the court had no legal right to pass a custodial sentence. His family argued that the decision is essentially a death sentence. Soldatov is known for using computers more than anyone else at the Kurchatov Institute. In 1990, his team began to think about how to connect the institute with other research centers in the country. They called the network Relcom. On August 28, 1990, the Soviet Union first established contact with the global Internet when Kurchatov’s programmers exchanged emails with a university in Helsinki, Finland. The isolated Soviet Union was connected to the global Internet thanks to Relcom . Relcom expanded rapidly, and many people began to use the word Relcom as short for Internet or email. Also read: WhatsApp’s new Nearby Share to enable file transfers without internet connection
Key Points
- Russian Internet pioneer Alexey Soldatov has been sentenced by a court to two years of hard labor for “abuse of power.”
- He is terminally ill, and his family argues that the decision is essentially a death sentence.
Actions
Pending intelligence enrichment.
