Although the Soviet Union had signed the Accords primarily due to foreign policy considerations, it ultimately accepted a text containing unprecedented human rights provisions.

"[8][9]: 99–100 The "Public Group to Promote Fulfillment of the Helsinki Accords in the USSR" was the idea of physicist Yuri Orlov, based on previous one-and-a-half-decade-old experience of dissent.

In its founding statement, the Group announced its goal to inform the heads of the signatory states as well as the world public "about cases of direct violations" of the Helsinki Accords.

The reports typically included a survey of a specific case, followed by a discussion of the human rights violations relevant to the Helsinki and other international accords as well as the Soviet constitution and law.

[16]: 150 The Helsinki Group would then campaign internationally by passing on the reports on the violations for publication abroad, calling for intervention by the other signatory states.

The Group's strategy was to make thirty-five copies of each document and send them by registered mail to the thirty-four Moscow embassies affiliated with the CSCE and directly to Leonid Brezhnev.

Western journalists, in particular those posted to Moscow bureaus or working for the Voice of America or Radio Liberty, also disseminated the information and were essential to the development of a broader Helsinki network.

[16]: 150 In January 1977, Alexander Podrabinek along with a 47-year-old self-educated worker Feliks Serebrov, a 30-year-old computer programmer Vyacheslav Bakhmin and Irina Kuplun established the Working Commission to Investigate the Use of Psychiatry for Political Purposes.

[18][19] It was composed of five open members and several anonymous ones, including a few psychiatrists who, at great danger to themselves, conducted their own independent examinations of cases of alleged psychiatric abuse.

[23]: 7858  In 1977, KGB head Yuri Andropov said: "The need has thus emerged to terminate the actions of Orlov, fellow Helsinki monitor Alexander Ginzburg and others once and for all, on the basis of existing law.

The Moscow and Ukrainian Helsinki Groups and the Russian section of Amnesty International issued a joint statement denying any participation in the attack and emphasized their adherence to the principle of non-violent protest.

[16]: 151 During the following year, a number of members were sentenced to prison camps, incarcerated in psychiatric institutions, and sent into internal exile within the USSR:[24] The Soviet authorities encouraged other activists to emigrate.

Founding members of the Moscow Helsinki Group emigrated - Mikhail Bernshtam, Alexander Korchak and Vitaly Rubin.

[27][28] In July 1989, the Moscow Helsinki Group was re-established by human rights activists Vyacheslav Bakhmin, Larisa Bogoraz, Sergei Kovalev, Alexey Smirnov, Lev Timofeev, and Boris Zolotukhin.

[30] As of 2021[update], MHG is co-chaired by two participants of the Soviet-era dissident movement - Vyacheslav Bakhmin (political prisoner in 1980-84) and Valery Borshchev (formerly Duma deputy from the opposition Yabloko party).

[31] Two of its main projects include: annual reports on the human rights situation in Russia;[32] monitoring police activities;[33] and educational programs.

[6] The Justice Ministry claimed that the organization's own charters do not meet the requirements of the law[36] and authorities alleged that they also prohibit it from defending human rights outside of Moscow, which co-chair Valery Borshchev dismissed as "nonsense".