According to Vedomosti and Kommersant, four departments at once – the Ministry of Economy, the Ministry of Health, Roskomnadzor and the Ministry of Finance – are working on a bill that will oblige video game developers to label content by age categories, and at the same time prohibit the distribution of games in Russia with information that violates the law.
The bill amends two federal laws – “On Information” and “On the protection of children from information that harms their health.” The purpose of the amendments, as interpreted in the bill, is “ensuring the safety of computer game content for the health of citizens” and “preventing the commission of dangerous acts under the influence of game content.”
As is clear from the wording, the developers themselves will have to label the games. At the same time, they will have to be guided by the opinion of expert organizations, whose task will be to monitor the games in general for the presence of prohibited content in them. It is unclear what kind of expert organizations they will be. They are going to be selected by Roskomnadzor in the future.
The bill, as far as can be understood from the first publications about it, does not yet prescribe any sanctions against developers who refused to label, nor sanctions against sites that distribute these games.
The document should enter into force on March 1, 2024.