Mass media in the Information Security management system of Russia

Shvets Yana Valer'evna Postgraduate Student, Department of Organizational Design of Management Systems, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration 119606, Russia, g. Moscow, pr. Vernadskogo, 84 shvecana@gmail.com

Dorozhkova Polina Mikhailovna Consultant Falafel Books LLC 119071, Russia, g. Moscow, ul. Malaya Kaluzhskaya, 12 polina.dorozhkova@gmail.com

In the information society, the problem of information security is particularly acute – there is still no unified consolidated opinion in science about what exactly is behind the concept of "information security". There are a number of research concepts on the basis of which the most general definition could be formulated. In this paper, due to the specifics of the designated topic, we will first of all refer to the definition formulated in the Information Security Doctrine of the Russian Federation.

So, how relevant is the media problem?  It may seem that cybercrime is one of the most important problems in the field of information security today. The danger in this case is personal in nature – someone can empty your e-wallet or hack your social network account. And although the information field is expanding, and with it the range of various problems is increasing, some things remain unchanged – for example, the specifics of human interaction with the media. Along with new communication methods, the old information-manipulative technologies are developing and threats are changing. The damage from them can be felt after a sufficiently long time lag, in several years or even decades, and affect not the financial condition of a person, but his civic consciousness – definitely, things are more fragile and important. I would like to note that in this paper we consider information security in a somewhat reduced way: leaving aside economic and military issues, we would like to pay special attention to the role played by the media in the information security management system. Since the media is the main tool through which information and manipulative technologies are used, the subject of the system can not only influence public opinion, but also literally shape it.

Part 1: Documents and bodies

The main regulatory and methodological document, which formulates the official position of the state regarding information security, isThe Information Security Doctrine of the Russian Federation^[1]. This document includes the principles that guide the state policy in the field of information security. Two similar documents have already appeared in modern Russia: the first one was in 2000, immediately after Vladimir Putin was elected president of the Russian Federation for the first time. The second was in 2016, in the wake of the aggravation of relations with the West.

In December 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin approved the new information security doctrine of Russia. The first thing you should pay attention to in it is the definition of the concept of "information security": the state of protection of the individual, society and the state from internal and external information threats, in which the realization of constitutional rights and freedoms of man and citizen, decent quality and standard of living of citizens, sovereignty, territorial integrity and sustainable socio-economic development of the Russian Federation, defense and security of the state.

The structure of the Doctrine is as follows: the definition is followed by an enumeration of national interests. Further, the document formulates the main information threats and strategic goals that the participants of the information security system should strive to achieve (among them, the media occupy an important place).

If we compare the content of the old document with its updated version, it is necessary to pay attention to the following points directly related to the media (they were absent in the 2000 version):

– one of the key national interests is called "the promotion of reliable information about the state policy of Russia and its official position on socially significant events in the country and the world."

– among the main information threats are the following: an increase in the number of publications with a biased assessment of Russian state policy and discrimination against Russian media and their employees abroad;

– the strategic goal is to neutralize the informational impact aimed at eroding traditional Russian spiritual and moral values.

You don't need to be a deep analyst to see the general nature of the changes – in 2000, at the start of the first presidential term, it was important for Vladimir Putin as a new national leader to indicate his openness to foreign colleagues. 16 years later, this agenda turned out to be unclaimed – the foreign policy conjuncture in relation to the West is changing, and it is important for the state to rethink the vectors of development in all areas.

It is important to note that the doctrine is rather conceptual in nature and is a general framework for working on regulatory documents – unlike the strategy, which is tied to specific deadlines and requires more detailed study. It would be logical to assume that the Doctrine will prompt the emergence of a number of measures aimed at changing the current legislation – but sometimes work on changing regulatory documents takes place even before the doctrine is adopted.

In February 2016, this is exactly what happened with the main regulatory legal act in the field of mass media - the Law of the Russian Federation "On Mass Media" of 27.12.1991 ^[2]. Several deputies of the State Duma proposed a number of amendments related to the restriction of foreign capital in the media – now foreign legal entities or individuals can directly or indirectly own and control up to 20% of shares or stakes. The authors of the amendments explained their own initiative by the presence of a "cold information war against Russia" – in the Doctrine that will appear a few months later, this wording will appear as one of the national threats.

Roskomnadzor, the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Communications, monitors the implementation of all legal and legislative norms related to the media. This organization is engaged in the registration of mass media and issues licenses for broadcasting activities, as well as issues warnings to the media and decides to block online publications.

Part 2: Analysis of the Russian media system from the point of view of information security

To begin with, we would like to analyze how effectively the state can solve the problem of information security in the Russian media field. Following the logic of the Doctrine, we should pay attention to two vectors: foreign policy (the image of Russia abroad) and domestic policy (information impact on the citizens of the Russian Federation). But first it's worth understanding which media can be considered effective at all now.

In 2015, the Federal Law of the Russian Federation No. 257-FZ of July 13, 2015 "On Amendments to the Law of the Russian Federation "On Mass Media" and the Federal Law of the Russian Federation "On Communications" was adopted ^[3]. Its main message is the distribution of mandatory publicly available free TV channels. This list currently includes 20 TV channels – and only 6 of them are not controlled by the state (all the others belong either to state corporations or alliances of private owners and the state). This step was the final step in the policy of nationalization of media in Russia.

Television has long remained (and most likely will remain for a long time) the main instrument of influence on public opinion inside Russia – and to gain control over it was a top priority from the point of view of information security. It is enough to recall the situation in the Russian media landscape of the 2000s, known as the "Capture of NTV". The NTV channel, owned at that time by the oligarch Vladimir Gusinsky, was the largest private TV channel in Russia – a number of critical speeches in the media directed against the authorities led to a change of ownership (after Gusinsky, Gazprom-Media became it). In parallel with NTV, a similar situation unfolded on ORT (today Channel One): in 2000, the oligarch Boris Berezovsky sold his stake in ORT (49%) due to disagreements with the Russian authorities. According to open sources, 38.9% of the channel belongs to the state represented by the Federal Property Management Agency. Another 24% belongs to Roman Abramovich's ORT-KB LLC, and the block package belongs to Yuri Kovalchuk's National Media Group ^[4].

The wars of 18 years ago have long become history – then television was really the main channel for transmitting information, and it was worth fighting for control over it. But is it as important as before?

In February 2017, the FOM presented the results of a poll ^[5], during which it turned out that 78% of Russians still learn news from television and 39% from the Internet. There is an important trend hidden inside the dry figures: the audience that draws news from the Internet is steadily growing. There is another, no less important parameter – the level of trust of Russians in television, which, in comparison with the previous survey, fell from 63% to 50%).

This noticeable decline is not just a signal of the inefficiency of the current system, but also a sign of the emergence of more competitive, online media. The tendency existing on Russian television to reduce different points of view can hardly be a sign of a balanced system – on the one hand, the state needs to ensure information unity on the territory of the country, on the other hand, to preserve diversity and pluralism. The master of Russian journalism, Yasen Nikolaevich Zasursky, writes about this in his article ^[6]. Talking about the creation of public-law television, he speaks of an ambiguous understanding of the word "state". It can be interpreted as the interests of a certain group of people who find themselves in power, and on the other hand – as a set of interests of all citizens of the country. It is the second concept that seems to us more sensible and balanced – because it allows us to keep a distance between providing information and manipulation. At the moment, on the contrary, most television channels strive to present a uniformity of opinions.

This also reveals another threat, which the famous sociologist Sergey Kara-Murza writes about in his book "Manipulation of Consciousness". Published in 2000, this work has not lost its relevance to this day – given that at the moment Russia is in a state of active information war with foreign countries. Kara-Murza writes:  "one of the most important rules of mind manipulation states that success depends on how completely it was possible to isolate the addressee from outside influence. The ideal situation for this would be the totality of the impact – the complete absence of alternative, uncontrolled sources of information and opinion. Manipulation is incompatible with dialogue and public debate ^{[7, p. 87]}."

As for the foreign policy sphere, it is worth highlighting two main state initiatives of recent years: This is the creation of the Russian international channel Russia Today and the emergence of the international news agency "Russia Today" (after the liquidation of the agency "RIA Novosti".)

The main purpose of broadcasting Russia Today is stated as acquaintance of the foreign audience with the point of view of Russia on the main international events. The radius of RT broadcasting abroad has been expanding exponentially in recent years: in 2010, broadcasting from the USA began, in 2014 – from the UK and in 2017 – from France. It is RT's activities that cause particular concern in the West and provoke criticism from Western politicians and experts: Western politicians see its propaganda component as a threat to European interests (this was discussed at the last meeting of the European Parliament in January 2018 ^[8]). The latest major scandal related to RT broadcasting provoked retaliatory measures against foreign media by the Russian authorities. In November 2017, according to the rules of the US Department of Justice, RT TV channel registered in the USA as a foreign agent. The Russian side quickly prepared its response: the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation unanimously approved an amendment to the bill that allows the Ministry of Justice to include media outlets in the list of foreign agents (previously, only NGOs could receive the status of a "foreign agent").

The Rossiya Segodnya agency as a whole pursues the same goal as the Russia Today TV channel – "to restore a fair attitude towards Russia." Dmitry Kiselyov, the agency's director General, spoke about this in an interview with Rossiya-24 TV channel. At the moment, among the functions of Rossiya Segodnya are the maintenance of news feeds in several languages, the production and distribution of photo content, work on a resource of translated foreign materials InoSMI and work on a major international project – the Sputnik news agency. The main area of activity of “Russia Today” affects the Internet.

Summing up the above, we can say that the mass media have a strong influence on public consciousness. In this case, it is important to understand who exactly uses the media as a tool of manipulation – an adequate analysis of these processes will ensure national and information security.