MOSCOW. Jan 29 (Interfax) - Access to information resources of the Swiss mail service Protonmail.com has been restricted in Russia due to the sending of false bomb threats, the Federal Security Service said in a statement.
"On the basis of the representation of the Russian Prosecutor General's Office, access to information resources of the foreign mail service Protonmail.com was restricted in Russia jointly with Roskomnadzor on January 29, 2020," a representative of the FSB public relations center told Interfax on Wednesday.
According to the FSB, access to the Dutch mail service Startmail.com was restricted in Russia on January 23, 2020, after over 1,000 anonymous bomb threats were sent to more than 16,000 social sites in 16 Russian regions via that service since November 28, 2019.
"At the same time, anonymous senders have been using the mail service Protonmail.com since January 24 to continue their criminal activity," the representative said.
Such threats have been received by courts in four Russian constituent territories, the FSB said. The messages claimed bombs at 830 social and transport facilities, such as schools, kindergartens, hospitals, transport sites, shopping malls, and others. None of the threats proved real.
"In 2019, the mail service was used by criminals to send false terrorist threats to 123 facilities of the kind," the representative said.