PROBLEMS OF DIGITALIZATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL INFORMATION IN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION AS ONE OF THE CONDITIONS FOR ITS RELIABILITY

Kristina Suslikova, Ph.D. PhD Student /Voronezh State University

Abstract: Environmental security is one of the most important types of national security in the Russian Federation: it is impossible for further development of the country, for present and future generations to live a full life without the preservation and restoration of Nature. In this respect the article emphasizes the importance of environmental social control and openness and accessibility to citizens to reliable environmental information as a necessary condition for its implementation.
According to the author, who bases his conclusion on the present legislation, digital technologies should be used to solve this problem. The using of such technologies in the modern informational society, as well as the development of technical capabilities, forms a new digital environment including environmental legal relations. One of the main goals of the large-scale governmental digitalization, carried out in the last decade, is to ensure the openness and accessibility of government bodies for citizens and their organizations. Digital transformation of the state is one of the key national goals of Russia’s development, and governmental information systems, including environmental ones, are one of its most important components, for which huge sums are allocated from the federal budget.
According to the environmental legislation citizens and public organizations can track information about the air and water quality on the relevant governmental websites. Using concrete examples, the author shows that environmental information is often outdated and contradictory. The article draws attention to the fact that often official data do not correspond to the information of public organizations and the conclusions of environmental scientists. In this respect the problem of the reliability of information about the environment, guaranteed by article 42 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, is becoming increasingly relevant.
This situation is explained by the imperfection of technologies for collecting and analyzing environmental information, as well as the digitalization of this information itself and the imperfection of the relevant legal basis. In this respect the digitalization of environmental information should be carried out simultaneously with the relevant legislative changes, with the adjustment and improvement of existing mechanisms for providing environmental information for open access.

Keywords: digitalization of environmental information, state information systems, environmental information, reliability of environmental information, openness and accessibility of environmental information.