SORM is a Russian acronym for "Systema Operativno-Rozysknikh Meropriatiy." It is the "System of Operative Search Measures" that aids search and surveillance in Russia. The attempt can be traced back to many earlier years when Soviet KGB had tapped telephone calls.
The attempt was then improvised. In documents of the Ministry of Communications under Boris Yeltsin, SORM was first mentioned in a decree on November 11th, 1994. The decree was about phone eavesdropping and said the SORM would be established on Russia's communications lines.
According to The Guardian, Sergei Mishenkov who was chief of the scientific department in the Ministry of Communications at the time, was the person in charge of supervising the early SORM research "at the request and with the financial support" of the Russian security services.
In short, SORM is practically a backdoor to Russia's internet, and it was one of which that made Kremlin in transforming Russia into a surveillance state.
The SORM system has many versions as it was upgraded and replaced several times.
SORM-1 was launched in 1996, a year after a Russian law allowed the Federal Security Service (FSB) to monitor telephone and internet communications.
SORM-2 was launched in 1998, allowing the monitoring of the internet. With it, the FSB can intercept any internet information transaction, including social networks, chats, forums, emails and also credit cards.
SORM-3 was launched in 2014, and it introduced wiretapping system. The system encompasses all telecommunications made by people in Russia.
When President Vladimir Putin was appointed as President in the year 2000, he amended the law to allow other federal security agencies, not just the FSB, to access the database collected by SORM. They include Russia's police and tax police, Federal Protective Service, The Ministry of Internal Affairs, Kremlin Regiment, Presidential Security Service, Parliamentary security services and the Warrant and notification regulations.
To make the project possible, the Russian government asked local Internet Service Providers (ISP) to install a special device the size of an old video tape recorder that allows the FSB to intercept data from users. The devices should be used and installed at the ISP's expense while ISP themselves aren't given the access to read anything on them.
ISPs that failed to comply and install the FSB-recommended SORM devices, were fined by the government.
In February 2016, two Russian ISPs have agreed to take to court the FSB to challenge the legality of SORM.
