On June 12, Russia’s Independence Day, two journalists were detained in the Moscow Metro as a result of its newly installed facial recognition software. Those arrested were SOTA correspondent Piotr Ivanov and journalist Asya Kazantseva. Both were released shortly after. They were among 43 detained using the new system. Kazantseva later claimed that during her conversation with the police, they said that all people that had previous administrative offences to their name should not be entering the metro on Russian Independence Day. According to SOTA, a photo of its correspondent Pyotr Ivanov was also uploaded to the Moscow Sphere camera surveillance system from one of the streams previously held on Sota.