Since the start of 2026, legal entities in Belarus, including civil society organisations (CSOs), have been receiving notices from the executive authorities, requiring them to use email services, hosted within the national segment of the internet. These requests are justified and based on the old Edict № 60 from 1st February 2010.
It appears that the reason for using the old act to justify the new practice lies in the preparations for adoption and entry into force of a new law. The law provides changes on the registration of legal entities introducing the concept of an ”official organisational email address”.
At the same time, letters from government bodies emphasise that it is unacceptable to use emailing providers linked to extremist activities. Particular attention was paid to TUT.BY, which is included in the list of internet domain names to which access is restricted.
“The decision to completely block the operation of resources associated with the TUT.BY identifier, following notification of business entities, was confirmed by competent officials from regulatory and law enforcement bodies,” an industry source told the Belarusian media.
The TUT.BY case
TUT.BY was a major Belarusian media corporation that emerged in the 1990s and, in the early years of its existence, became the largest and most widely used free email service, used by millions of Belarusians, including CSOs. Later, TUT.BY becomes Belarus’s largest online news portal. Some state institutions still continue to use it to this day, despite TUT.BY being declared an extremist organisation , and despite the effective destruction of this IT giant’s infrastructure inside the country.
In 2021, TUT.BY’s online content was deemed extremist. This decision was made on 13 August 2021 by the Central District Court of Minsk. The case was heard on camera, at the request of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. It was accused of propagating extremism aimed at inciting “social enmity or discord, organising and carrying out mass disturbances, as well as inciting political and ideological enmity”. The court’s ruling also applied to the logos and digital watermarks of TUT.BY and Z (the Zerkalo project, launched by former editorial staff). The Ministry of Information restricted access to the websites, their mirror sites, and to associatedsites with different URLs.
In Belarus, the content of the TUT.BY portal, its social media accounts, and its founding company, TUT BY MEDIA LLC, have been designated as extremist, while the organisation itself has been classified as extremist. On June 14, 2022, the Minsk Economic Court designated "TUT BY MEDIA" LLC as an extremist organization, prohibiting its operations, logos, and digital content. This means that the distribution, storing, and even reposting of content is considered an offence. Subscribing to, reposting, and saving materials (including from archives) is subject to administrative (fines), or criminal liability.
In early 2026, Beltelecom, the largest state-controlled provider, informed its corporate clients:
«Attention corporate subscribers! Beltelecom advises that you must change your email address by 18 February 2026. Due to the inclusion of the @tut.by domain name in the national list of extremist materials, notifications will no longer be sent to email addresses belonging to this mail service from 1 March 2026. To change their contact email address, legal entities and sole traders must inform “Beltelecom” by any convenient means»
Other services will also be sending out similar messages in the spring of 2026.
However, the government’s letter specifies that both international Gmail accounts and Russian Yandex accounts are prohibited for use.
Freedom of association further restricted as official CSOs email address may only be in national domain
The Belarusian Government submitted in 2025 the draft law On State Registration and Liquidation (Termination of Activities) of Economic Entities to the Parliament. It was passed at its second reading on 17 April 2026, and is likely to complete all stages of the promulgation process by June at the latest.
Developed by the Ministry of Justice, the law is intended to replace the Presidential Decree No. 1 of 2009, which currently regulates these issues. However, the bill contains some significant novelties that affect CSOs.
The draft law requires the official email of a legal entity upon registration. The registration of an organisation without a valid email address will not be possible.
The organisation bears the risk of the consequences for not receiving legally significant messages sent to its registered address, or to the email address specified in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities. Legal entities will be required to submit a notification of changes of the official email within ten business days, next to the already existing obligation to report a change in legal address, appointment of a new chief executive, and the start of the reorganisation procedure. The bill establishes the filing and submitting of an application for registration of a legal entity in the online form on the web-portal of a state agency. Even if the founders want to submit the registration package in-person, the printed completed online form with reference number must be attached to the package of documents for registration. It will be impossible to submit documents for registration through postal mail.
Thus, an analysis of the new practices and requirements contained in the draft lawm which is highly likely to be adopted points to an alarming legal framework:
- All legal entities, including public organisations, will be required to have an official email address.
- This official email address must be on a national domain.
- The largest national email provider has been declared illegal.
If the new registration law comes into force, the main way for newly established CSOs to register will be to set up a mandatory email address on their own domain within the .by zone. This will further restrict and put additional burdens on individuals and organisations, while their freedom of association is already restricted in Belarus. It also raises concerns and violations of other civic freedoms in the context of limiting the digital technologies (in this case the email provider) that can be used by organisations.