On the issue of the Resolution No. 515 adopted by the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan dated July 22, 2022

On May 3, 2022, the Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan “On Amendments and Additions to Certain Legislative Acts of the Republic of Kazakhstan on the Protection of the Rights of the Child, Education, Information and Informatization” (hereinafter referred to as the Law) was signed, which provides for the development of a number of subordinate regulatory legal acts affecting the competence of the authorized state body in the field of mass media:

1) the procedure for maintaining the register of legal representatives of foreign online platforms and (or) instant messaging services that interact with the authorized body in the field of mass media;

2) the procedure for creating an expert group as well as considering an application on the facts of cyberbullying against a child;

3) rules of interaction between state bodies on issues of compliance with the requirements of the legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan in telecommunications networks;

4) the procedure for resuming access to the Internet resource.

Within the framework of the consolidation of the new competencies and functions of the authorized state body provided for by the said Law in accordance with the requirements of the legislation, as well as in accordance with subparagraph 4) paragraph 4 of the Instruction on the development and approval of the regulations on the state body approved by the Decree of the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan dated September 1, 2021 No. 590, the basis for making an addition to the regulation is the endowment of the state body with new powers, expansion (narrowing) and (or) exclusion of the powers of the state body.

In this connection by Decree of the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan dated July 22, 2022 No. 515 (hereinafter referred to as the Decree), amendments were made to the Decree of the Government dated March 26, 2019 No. 142 “On Certain Issues of the Ministry of Information and Social Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan”.

It should be noted that the powers of the Ministry of Information and Social Development provided for by the said resolution in terms of determining the number of users of online platforms and restricting access to them are not new, but follow from the norms of the Law.

Thus, paragraph 3 of Article 18-2 of the Law “On Informatization” already provides for a rule on the installation by online platforms and instant messaging services operating on the Internet in the territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan, a program to determine the number of their users.

Paragraph 4 of the above article establishes that the authorized body in the field of mass media has the right to:

1) in order to verify the information on the number of users of the online platform or instant messaging service, request information on the number of users per day from the online platform or instant messaging service;

2) if the online platform or instant messaging service does not install a program to determine the number of users of an information resource on the Internet, determine the number of users using its own resources.

In turn, according to paragraph 1 of Article 18-2 and paragraph 3 of Article 66 of the Law "On Informatization", in order to carry out activities in the territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan, foreign online platforms or instant messaging services must appoint their legal representative for interaction with the authorized body.

At the same time, if they continue their activities without complying with this requirement, the authorized body has the right to restrict their activities in the territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Thus, in the resolution adopted by the Government there are no new competencies or norms that do not follow from the Law “On Amendments and Additions to Certain Legislative Acts of the Republic of Kazakhstan on the Protection of the Rights of the Child, Education, Information and Informatization”.