Deterioration of the quality of the environment, including its natural component - land, is becoming stable in modern conditions. Within the framework of this study, the need to form preventive mechanisms for damage to land is substantiated based on the content of its social danger. However, for full-fledged mechanisms that are really capable of realizing soil protection, the assessment of public danger should be carried out based on the actual data of the harm caused, while relying on indicators of environmental pollution of soils, necessarily taking into account the sphere of human activity that they are produced by. Thus, the results of the study showed that the greatest anthropogenic impact on the soil is exerted by industrial facilities, the harmful effect of which has no opposition from the imperative mechanisms of prevention. The elimination of this gap and the development of appropriate mechanisms for protecting the land, its properties and qualities in connection with the functioning of the industry can bring the system of prevention of such acts to a new, higher level.