Russia will not introduce a separate fee for foreign internet traffic. The Ministry of Digital Development is not currently considering such a measure. This was stated by Ivan Lebedev, Deputy Head of the Russian Ministry of Digital Development, during a plenary session in the State Duma.
Mobile users will not have to pay extra for access to foreign resources, the deputy head of the department emphasized.
A fee for foreign traffic is not being considered.
The idea of introducing a separate fee for international internet traffic was previously discussed in connection with the growing use of VPN services. In March, Forbes, citing a source, claimed that Maksut Shadaev, the Minister of Digital Development, allegedly asked telecom operators to introduce a fee from May 1 for using more than 15 GB of international traffic per month on mobile networks.
According to these data, Russians could pay an average of about 150 rubles for each additional gigabyte above the established limit. The measure was considered one of the ways to combat the use of VPN services.
At the same time, representatives of organizations that participated in discussions with the Ministry of Digital Development told Vedomosti that operators asked to postpone the possible introduction of such a fee. According to two sources, companies were not technically ready to start collecting additional payments within the specified timeframe due to difficulties with setting up billing systems.