QR-code and vaccination certificates: how to prove to robots that you have it

Novye Izvestia went into the matter.

Irina Mishina

Many of those who had the cherished QR codes gathered in the Tretyakov Gallery on "covid vacations". Among them was the host of radio "Culture", the famous journalist Vladislav Boretsky. However, the vaccinated and even revaccinated Vladislav Rudolfovich, armed with a QR code valid until March 2022, a vaccinated person's passport and SNILS, was never able to join the great art.

“At the entrance, right behind the sculptural portrait of Pavel Mikhalych, two uncles are checking electronic and other tickets and quark codes. Business as usual. I take out my phone, find my daddy with my code (I also took my passport, I know where I live), show it to my uncle. He pokes my Galaxy with a device that looks like a mix of a dildo and a mini cash register. The red frame lights up. "Your code is invalid," says my uncle and pulls the unit to the aunt following me. "How is it?" - I think and show, under this square it says: “Valid until 03/22/2022.” So, I say, it is valid until March of next year! here it is! - I almost shout. - It is written! ". “I can't help you at all,” the security pillar completely loses interest in the discussion. I retreat, although most of all for the whole Lavrushinsky I want to overlay it with concrete obscene. No, I have no questions for the chain dog. But here's what haunts: if the state. uncles and state. aunts yell from every iron that vaccination is God, and the kuar code is his prophet, and you will have a passage everywhere, if you have (and I have), then is it really impossible to bring ALL THIS to the minimum functional state?", - the radio host is indignant.

An even more mysterious case happened to my colleague, journalist Natalya Naumova. “I had a qr-code of a patient who had been ill, in June I went on it a couple of times, where they asked, and I don’t pay attention, I know that it is valid until mid-November. I accidentally checked it myself the other day - scanned it from another phone: the red flag - "invalid". There is no sense to restore, he has two weeks left, but he had to not take tickets to the theater, ”the journalist said.

If you think that all this happens only in Moscow, you are wrong. The TV channel "Tsargrad", referring to the regional media, cites a case that emanates from the destruction of reality. “In Kopeysk, in the Chelyabinsk region, a family who had suffered a covid was not allowed into a shopping center. They did not wait for the document on the portal, the process was delayed for unknown "objective reasons", and they went to the store with information. The father of the family said: “We explain to the guards that we are ill, here are the medical documents. We read and show the official response from the State Services about the delay. Right there, to our right, without going into the store, there is an active fitting of jackets. The seller passes through the fence one by one. Moreover, the client who tries on does not have a mask at all. They didn’t let us in. We turned around and heard the laughter of the guards in the back. I turned around and asked what was funny. In response I heard: "Don't get sick anymore." The buyer demanded a complaint book, but was refused: "You are not in the store, we are not obliged to give you anything."

In social networks, users massively share their negative experiences and thoughts about the presentation of QR-codes.

Vladimir Igorevich Yakushenko: “I tested antibodies after an illness, got a positive result and the status I HAPPENED. QR came to public services. For 2 week. Then they extended it by another two. And that's all".

Maria Antonova: “We were specially vaccinated to make life easier for ourselves, but in reality nothing works. Tomorrow we'll go to the Sovremennik theater, I'll take a military ID just in case".

Natalya Korzhova: “My daughter does not have the Internet, and she also does not have her in public services, so she will get a second vaccination, and what next?”

On the day of renewal of certificates for public services, I also decided to try my luck and went to an art gallery on Krymsky Val to an exhibition of Yuri Pimenov. But I did not succeed in joining the art of socialist realism: my QR code of a recovered and vaccinated person, valid, judging by the information on the state services website, until September 17, 2022, also for some unknown reason did not work. The guard's device didn't count him. On the eve of my visit to the Bolshoi Theater with its not cheap tickets, this question, as you understand, acquired a special urgency for me. After I was "rejected" by a security guard on Krymsky Val, I did not accept it and called the Support of State Services. The gentle voice of the answering machine for about 3 minutes listed all the options that must be selected in order to receive at least some information. After the chosen topic, the voice of artificial intelligence insinuatingly announced that there were "only 35 minutes left before the connection with the operator." The AI was very kind and advised me to “get information in the chat on the government services portal”. To get an answer in this case, as you understand, it would take an indefinite amount of time.

Friends, by great pull, shared with me the hotline telephone of the Moscow social development complex, where they advise on the coronavirus and related documents ( for everyone, I tell Muscovites this cherished number: 495 870 45 09 ). The operator listened to me with understanding and asked me to wait, since she needed someone's advice. The outcome of this consultation was not encouraging. “In your case, all questions to the staff of the art gallery, why their device does not read the QR code. In general, the codes were updated, in this regard, the corresponding section of the public services portal was rebooted. If you go to the theater, we advise you to contact the theater the day before to check whether their device reads your QR code, "advised the hotline operator of the Moscow social development complex.

In theory, all these QR codes and vaccination certificates were introduced in order to make life easier for vaccinated and ill citizens. But in fact, their fate was sometimes more difficult than the life of the unvaccinated. At least access to places of mass use, promised to the vaccinated, turned out to be thorny. And the advice to come to the theater the day before and check how the QR code is read by the local guard is generally beyond common sense.

The fact that since November 8, many certificates of vaccination against coronavirus have become invalid on the State Services, Telegram channels from a number of regions report. The Moscow Novosti Telegram channel writes about massive complaints from readers about this problem, and the Moscow Novosti channel published a screenshot sent by the reader with an invalid valid certificate of the vaccinated. "Initially, it was reported that the error affected only those who were vaccinated more than six months ago, but reports of a failure are also coming from those who were vaccinated later, " the Moskvich magazine reports.

The scandal did not go unnoticed, and the Ministry of Digital Industry hastened to report on the victory over "temporary difficulties". "We were so quick to fix it because of indifferent customers who reported a problem I know that the issue with the QR-code sensitive, so in the future for all such work will be provided with additional technical control", - said the Minister for Digital Development, Communications and Mass communications of the Russian Federation Maksut Shadayev.

Why were all these updates and replacement of certificates for new ones needed? The new documents are reported to contain more information than the old version. Previously issued "covid passports" are reissued for a period until March 1, 2022 automatically. But for many, after this update, the validity period of QR codes has decreased. For example, Echo of Moscow radiostation journalist Alexander Plyushchev writes in his Telegram channel that the new certificates are supposedly less effective. “It is important that now for all the term in them is six months, not a year. I was revaccinated in August, my term is now until February. Look for yourself in government services, ”the journalist suggests. It turns out that those who were vaccinated before May 8 (second vaccination), the document has already expired, says Plushev. According to him, by doing so, the officials seem to have "created confusion and panic out of the blue".

Feeling a catch and losing faith in public services, our resourceful people began to invent ways to defeat QR codes.

- On October 31, in Buryatia, grandmothers without QR codes stormed a shopping and entertainment center. Enraged pensioners with the words "This is not a Russian word!" pounced on the guard. Under pressure, he surrendered, and a group of elderly customers eventually entered the trading floor. The video of the assault spread across the networks.

- According to media reports, a real “small QR-business” has begun to develop in Voronezh, Yekaterinburg and Perm. So, in cities and towns the service "Go to the store by QR-code" is gaining momentum. Vaccinated people offer anti-axers to go for milk and bread, since those who are not vaccinated in a number of regions do not have a code and, accordingly, have no chance of getting into the store. At the end of October, the service of such a "Timurovite" in Kurgan cost 300 rubles, and on November 1 they already asked for 500 rubles. Inflation, they say. In neighboring Yekaterinburg, the price for a trip to the store immediately started from 500 rubles. But in Novokuibyshevsk they agree to go for groceries for 150 rubles.

- In Perm, another service is being extended: there, for a visit with a child to a theater or a movie show with previously purchased tickets, parents who are not vaccinated are offered to pay 300 rubles. In the ad, the owner of the coveted QR code describes himself as a responsible and punctual person.

Something tells me that the failure with QR codes on the portal of public services is not the last, so folk wisdom will certainly invent new ways to bypass the prohibitions that have fallen on fellow citizens.