 Sinyavsky and Daniel's offenses were not illegal under Soviet law, as neither publication abroad nor the use of pseudonyms were prohibited.Instead, Sinyavsky and Daniel were charged, under the recently minted Article 70 of the RSFSR Criminal Code, with the offense of anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda.The article punished

Sinyavsky and Daniel's works published abroad were considered to consciously intend to subvert and weaken the Soviet system and constitute anti-Soviet progranda – the first time that the article was applied to fiction.