CBR will not apply measures to banks for working with companies whose sites are included in registry prohibited in Russia until end of 2026
MOSCOW. Dec 29 (Interfax) - The Central Bank of Russia has extended the period during which it will not apply measures to credit institutions for violating the ban on providing banking services to organizations whose websites are included in the unified registry of internet resources prohibited in Russia until the end of 2026.
According to the federal law on countering the legalization/laundering of criminally obtained incomes and financing of terrorism (law 115-FZ), banks are prohibited from conducting operations on behalf of individuals whose websites are included in the unified registry of the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor). The requirement came into force in the summer of 2021; however, in November 2021, the Central Bank postponed the application of measures to banks for violating it until April 2022. Subsequently, the regulator has repeatedly extended this measure.
The bill (N158779-8) on easing the rules for banks' work with internet resources was approved by the State Duma at its first reading back in November 2022 (it has still not been approved at its second reading). Credit institutions found themselves in a difficult situation, said Ilya Yasinsky, who at that time held the post of director of the Central Bank's Financial Monitoring and Currency Control Department. Banks are formally obligated to block any operations related to resources from the Roskomnadzor registry. "These could be major Russian search engines, primarily Yandex , so in order not to paralyze the activities of these organizations, this small clarification is being introduced," Yasinsky said during the consideration of the bill at its first reading.
According to the explanatory note to the bill, in the course of law enforcement practice, banks encountered difficulties when using information contained in the unified registry of prohibited domain names. The amendments proposed that the non-application of the ban on banking services to a client providing services using a site whose domain name/page URL is contained in the unified registry be enshrined in legislation, provided that access to such a name/URL is not restricted.
