Internet Freedom in Russia:
An Infrastructural Approach

Over the past decade, internet freedom in Russia has dramatically declined as a result of the state’s repressive policies and enhanced digital surveillance and censorship capacities. Yet, looking at the Russian state provides only a partial picture and risks obscuring the agency of various domestic and foreign (private) actors in shaping these processes. This talk shifts focus to the implementation and enforcement of restrictive Internet policies in Russia to examine how the actions of, among others, platform companies can enable, shape or constrain how these policies impact internet freedom.

Speakers: 

_____________________________

Speaker Biography

Dr. Mariëlle Wijermars is Assistant Professor in Cyber-Security and Politics. She conducts research on Internet governance with a focus on the impact of Internet policy on human rights, and on the framing of cyberthreats and policy responses. Her research is guided by an interest in the precarious balance between protecting citizens, infrastructures and institutions against cyberthreats and safeguarding rights and freedoms – from the right to privacy to the freedom of the press. Trained as a Russianist, her research draws upon Russia as its main empirical case study. Currently, Mariëlle is also a visiting researcher at the Aleksanteri Institute of the University of Helsinki, where she acts as the Principle Investigator of the project Sustainable Journalism for the Algorithmic Future funded by the Helsingin Sanomat Foundation (2020-2022). The project examines the adoption of digital technologies in Russian news media and the role of Russian ‘big tech’ (Yandex) in shaping the Russian information space. She is involved in the Nordic workshop series ‘Algorithmic Governance in Context: Towards a Comparative Agenda for Studies of Algorithmic Governance across Politics, Culture, and Economy’, funded by NOS-HS (2019-2020), and is a member of the Expert Pool on Cyber and Expert Pool on Russia of the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats (Hybrid CoE). She is currently on research leave at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies where she serves as a CORE Fellow.