The State Duma proposed fining developers up to 5 million rubles for anti-Russian content in games
Anatoly Vyborny, Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption, believes that the Russian authorities should penalize gaming companies whose projects contain anti-Russian content. He is preparing corresponding amendments to the Code of Administrative Offenses.
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In a conversation with the newspaper "Izvestia," Vyborny stated that games have become one of the tools of propaganda, making it important to monitor the ideas embedded in them.
“Through such content, [Western politicians] incite hatred against certain nations, including Russians, imposing stereotypes, for instance, that Nazism is good. Unfortunately, the legislature has not yet responded to this in any way. There is no direct ban on the dissemination of illegal, Russophobic, defamatory information about our country and citizens, nor punishment for this,” said Vyborny.
According to the deputy, developers and distributors of games should bear the same responsibility that the media currently does. He reminded that Russian laws provide for fines on media for abusing the freedom of mass information. Something similar, Vyborny believes, needs to be implemented for gaming companies.
Vyborny proposed introducing fines ranging from 400,000 to 5 million rubles depending on the offense.
It should be noted that the State Duma has been reviewing a bill "On the activities of developing and distributing video games in the territory of the Russian Federation" for several months. It was submitted for consideration in December 2024 and was soon identified as needing further work. According to "Izvestia," another discussion of the bill will take place today, May 15.