Russian Federal Security Service is speaking about banning Skype, Gmail and Hotmail in our country since all these services are now regarded as a potential threat for Russia. «People use these three services all the time and we simply cannot control every user who logs on. And this, as you all understand, can lead to a situation when the safety of the country will not be provided! Besides, we cannot make any secret operations because we are not sure that all the information that is encoded will NOT be decoded by someone else afterwards», Alexandr Andreechkin says. Anyway by October 1st we all will be informed whether we will continue using Skype, Gmail and Hotmail or not.
I agree that banning these services is just one step back. If they continue thinking that banning everything will make our country more secure, then probably in some years we all will live without television, the radio and finally-without the Internet. This is stupid to believe that the conditions for RFSS's work will become better if they forbid us to use Skype for example because anyway any person who will crave for "decoding" their secret information, will definitely find some other way to do that. So this is so silly to deprive people of Skype or Hotmail or whatever else.
It's typical of people to get rid of something if they don't know the ways to control it. Here's a widespread stereotype - do not use it if you do not know it. But in fact, all these Internet services are to facilitate modern communication, to advance the level of transmitting and exchanging of information. We can't just discard what was designed for good intentions.
The issue is really disturbing and alarming! Banning these Internet services will take our country further back. Information and means to transmit and receive it are now a dangerous weapon and a potential threat to many in power. Unfortunately, RFSS don't want to work to guarantee security. It's wrong to control users! Security is often threatened by wgri\ongful decisions and policies that force people to protest. Since we all tend to refuse physical protest, we resort to communication technologies.