MOSCOW, May 22 (RAPSI) - Over the course of the next six weeks, Russian telecommunications watchdog Roskomnadzor will develop a procedure for shutting down blacklisted websites, Digit.ru reported Wednesday.

The procedure will be developed jointly with representatives of the Internet industry and will aim to prevent other websites from using the same IP address being blocked, while ensuring adherence to the law.

The blacklist of websites was approved on November 1, 2012 and is being monitored by Roskomnadzor. It primarily includes websites containing child pornography, instructions on committing suicide, and information on manufacturing drugs. If a website is found to be hosting this kind of information, it can be closed down without the involvement of the courts.

If a website contains other kinds of prohibited information, such as extremist materials, the decision to close it can only be made by a court. According to the rules, the site's management has three days to delete the prohibited information, otherwise telecommunications operators will block access to the site in Russia.

According to Digit.ru, Roskomnadzor experts have studied the international experience in restricting access to websites and proposed that telecoms operators come up with ideas of blocking domain addresses or filtering by URL address. The initiative has been posted on the Roskomnadzor website for public discussion.

"The excessive blocking of websites - meaning the closure of bona fide resources - should be avoided," Head of Roskomnadzor Alexander Zharov said.

As of March, the consumer rights regulator Rospotrebnadzor has analyzed 1,309 websites to determine whether they contain information promoting suicide and detailing different ways to end one's life and has issued 1,164 decisions on closing these websites. Over 40 decisions have been made with regard to YouTube videos, which the regulator believes to contain information promoting or explaining how to commit suicide.