OOO FLAVUS AND OTHERS v. RUSSIA JUDGMENT (c) Third-party interveners 25. The UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, an independent expert mandated by the Human Rights Council to report on the extent, nature and severity of restrictions and violations of freedom of expression, submitted that individuals should be allowed to enjoy the freedom of expression in online space to the same extent as they enjoyed it offline. States frequently adopted anti-extremism laws that were so broad as to give excessive discretion for authorities to restrict online expression, contrary to the lawfulness requirement. Such legislation prioritised restrictions on, rather than protection of, free expression as the primary State responsibility, and failed to define precisely limitations on online expression and justifications for those limitations. The wholesale blocking of websites rarely, if ever, satisfied the criteria for permissible limitations on freedom of expression, taking into account that permissible restrictions should be content-specific and should not target websites solely because they were critical of the government or political system. Finally, the Special Rapporteur emphasised that digital censorship through unaccountable and excessive website blocking was unacceptable and detrimental to the rule of law in the digital age. 26. ARTICLE 19, a global campaign for freedom of expression, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a legal and policy organisation safeguarding privacy in the digital world, Access Now, a global civil-society organisation defending the digital rights of users at risk, and Reporters without Borders, a French non-profit organisation defending freedom of the press, emphasised that international law standards applicable to measures for tackling online “extremism” included the requirement to establish a direct connection between online content and the alleged threat of violence. Vague and overly broad definitions of “extremism” had allowed States to suppress legitimate public dissent and criminalise speech and expression in opposition to the government. Blocking access to entire websites was an extreme and disproportionate measure which was incapable of distinguishing between lawful and unlawful content and, as such, should never be required by law. Even where blocking was permissible, the law should provide for the following minimum standards: (i) blocking should be ordered by a court or an independent adjudicatory body; (ii) interested parties should be given the opportunity to intervene in proceedings in which a blocking order was sought; (iii) all victims of blocking orders should have the right to challenge, after the fact, the blocking order; and (iv) anyone attempting to access a blocked website should be able to see the legal basis and reasons for the blocking order and information about avenues of appeal. Finally, the interveners emphasised that the blanket blocking of a website, without reference to specific unlawful content, should always be considered a disproportionate restriction on freedom of expression. 9