Russia’s communications regulator accused Twitter Monday for violating Russian law in saying the social media platform had failed to comply with some of its requests to remove banned content.
Roskomnadzor said Twitter had not deleted 2,862 posts containing suicide, pornography, and drug-related material since 2017. It could face a heavy fine if found guilty of repeatedly failing to remove content considered illegal under Russian law, it said. The platform is widely used by Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny and his allies to criticize the authorities and announce new protests.
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Twitter, who declined to comment, has been fined in the past for violating Russian data laws, but the penalties were relatively low. A court in Moscow was fined last year Twitter 4 million rubles ($ 54,000) for non-compliance with Russian data laws after the platform refused to locate its server containing data on Russian citizens on Russian territory. Russia has taken steps in recent months to exert more influence on foreign social media platforms.
Bills passed by the lower house last December allowed Russia to impose hefty fines on platforms that do not remove banned content and even restrict access to US social media giants if they ‘discriminate’ on Russian media. The State Department has also accused Facebook and other US platforms that do not identify fake messages related to unauthorized protests in support of Navalny, where police detained thousands of protesters across the country.
In January, President Vladimir Putin asked what he described as the growing influence of US social media giants and said their influence meant they were now competing with governments.
(This story was not edited by our editorial team and was generated from a feed.)
News Highlights
- Russia’s communications regulator accused Twitter Monday for violating Russian law in saying the social media platform had failed to comply with some of its requests to remove banned content. Roskomnadzor said Twitter had not deleted 2,862 posts since 2017 containing material related to suicide, pornography and drugs.
- Russia accuses Twitter of breaking the law by not removing content