Russia bans ‘The Daily Beast’

Anti-drug officials have blocked Russian Internet users’ access to the popular website The Daily Beast over an article titled “You Can Buy Pot Here: WeedPortal.com and Marijuana’s Lawless Online Frontier,” written by Abby Haglage.

The article was published on October 15, 2013, and the Russian government’s decision is dated April 21, 2015. According to the website Antizapret.info, Roskomnadzor, the Kremlin’s media watchdog, blacklisted The Daily Beast on April 29, 2015. On May 28, for unexplained reasons, Roskomnadzor removed the Web address from its blacklist and then immediately added it back, this time with three banned IP addresses, instead of the two that had been included before.

Haglage’s text lists several websites that sell marijuana online, including WeedPortal.com, WorldHerbal.com, SeedBay.com, and Nirvana.com, violating Russia’s laws against spreading information online about how to acquire illegal substances.