Digital Rights in Russian Legislation as a Definition: A Sociological Study of Public Perception in Russia

The author puts forward the hypothesis that a significant portion of Russia’s population interprets the term "digital rights" differently than as proposed in the interpretation of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, and conducts a pilot sociological study to test this hypothesis. The study results (taking into account the caveats regarding the objectivity of a pilot sociological study) show that the interpretation of the term "digital rights" among a broad range of respondents in Russia, in most responses, differs from the formulation—and, consequently, the concept of digital rights—that is present in the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. The author provides an overview of scholarly works by legal scholars, including their assessment of the definition of "digital rights" in Russian legislation.