The article presents the results of the authors’ research into the role of state communications policy in the process of learner sociocultural competence development (case study: higher education institutions offering the tourism industry personnel training programmes). The driving force behind the research was the authors’ belief in the unmonitored and frequently destructive influence of the media in general and the Internet in particular on the personality development of the youth, especially on the development of the system of values and social competences of those majoring in tourism-related disciplines. The research was empirically based of the starting data obtained from media publications content and interviews with educational process participants. The analysis of the data shows the disbalanced representation such dominants as ethics and communication standards, the ethics of cross-cultural communication, specifics of cross-cultural communication, tolerance, human ecology, human capital development, all of which are significant in terms of their positive contribution to the students’ moral development. The results of the research bring the authors to the conclusion that it is imperative that the state should initiate a professional inspection of the Internet content, especially the media publications concerning Russian history and the strategic objectives of modern Russian social development. The authors also propose a revised model of the state communications policy implementation as applied to the development of sociocultural competences of students majoring in tourism-related disciplines. The three levels of the model structure are the content level, the index level, and the reference level. The content level presupposes a targeted development of content; the index level involves quality inspections of media publications; the reference level concerns the creation of expert consultation mechanisms available for web communities and blogger to ensure high quality consistency and data soundness of the content produced.