ENGELS v. RUSSIA JUDGMENT They are a means of storing and accessing content and cannot be equated with content itself, whatever its legal status happens to be. Just as a printing press can be used to print anything from a school textbook to an extremist pamphlet, the Internet preserves and makes available a wealth of information, some portions of which may be proscribed for a variety of reasons particular to specific jurisdictions. Suppressing information about the technologies for accessing information online on the grounds they may incidentally facilitate access to extremist material is no different from seeking to restrict access to printers and photocopiers because they can be used for reproducing such material. The blocking of information about such technologies interferes with access to all content which might be accessed using those technologies. In the absence of a specific legal basis in domestic law, the Court finds that such a sweeping measure was arbitrary. 31. Turning next to the issue of the safeguards which domestic legislation must provide to protect individuals from the excessive and arbitrary effects of blocking measures, the Court considers that the breadth of the discretion afforded by subsection (5)(2) of section 15.1 of the Information Act is such that it is likely to be difficult, if not impossible, to challenge the court’s decision on appeal (see Kablis v. Russia, nos. 48310/16 and 59663/17, § 96, 30 April 2019). It also finds that the Russian law did not provide website owners, such as the applicant, with any procedural safeguards capable of protecting them against arbitrary interference. It did not require any form of involvement of the website owners in the blocking proceedings conducted under section 15.1 of the Information Act. The prosecutor’s application for a blocking order had been prepared without advance notification to the parties whose rights and interests were likely to be affected. Even though the applicant’s contact details had featured prominently on the website, he had not been informed or invited to explain the purpose of the information about unfiltered-browsing technologies. The Town Court had not invited him to intervene in the proceedings or to make submissions, treating the matter as being between the prosecutor and the local Internet service provider (ISP). 32. The Court finds that the participation of a local ISP as the designated defendant was not sufficient to endow the proceedings with an adversarial character. The ISP provides a connectivity technology enabling users to access millions of websites which it knows nothing about. It does not have the same detailed knowledge of their contents as their owners do; nor does it have the legal resources required to mount a vigorous defence of every targeted website. The ISP has no vested interest in the outcome of the proceedings. Blocking orders have no incidence on its connectivity business; they are enforceable not just against the defendant ISP but, once final, acquire universal effect requiring all Russian ISPs to implement blocking measures. The Court finds that the blocking proceedings which were conducted in the applicant’s absence were not adversarial in nature and did not provide a forum in which the interested parties could have been heard. Neither the prosecutor nor the Town Court made any assessment of the impact of the blocking measure prior to its implementation; nor did they explain the urgency of enforcing it immediately without giving the interested parties the opportunity to lodge an appeal. 33. Lastly, as regards the proceedings which the applicant instituted to challenge the blocking order, the Court notes that the domestic courts did not apply 9