A Russian court has fined Google $98 million as the company has failed to remove content that is deemed illegal in the country. Google has told The Verge that they will “study the court documents when they are available and then decide on next steps”. However, a Russian official has threatened Google with “very unpleasant measures” if Google doesn’t comply with their mandate.
Russia has mandated to delete banned content in their country. These include the promotion of drugs and posts by organisations that the Russian government find extremist or terroristic. Including content associated with the opposition leader, Alexei Navalny.
Google is also facing another fine in Russia over content moderation. This other one could double in size every week unless Google reverses its ban on a conservative Russian news channel. However, Google says the ban is due to US and UK sanctions against the channel’s owner.
As well as this, Russian regulators have pressured tech companies in non-financial ways too. A law passed in 2019 states that smartphones, computers and TVs would need to come with software from Russian developers pre-installed. Russian officials have also got Google and Apple to remove political opponents’ voting apps from their app stores by threatening to prosecute the companies’ locally-based employees.
