The western powers have been getting on the nerves of Russian President Vladimir Putin. And in such a tense situation, the social media giants are also getting on the wrong side of the President of the Russian Federation. Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) said on Monday that had initiated proceedings against US tech giant Alphabet Inc’s Google for allegedly abusing its dominant market position in video hosting services.
Authorities have already put pressure on Google this year for failing to remove what Russia calls “banned content.” Moscow has also threatened other western internet businesses, including Twitter Inc, which has been severely slowed.
The regulator said it had launched the probe after receiving a complaint from the Regional Public Centre for Internet Technologies (ROTsIT), a group presenting itself as defending the interests of Russian internet users. “The fact that the publication and broadcasting of video content in Russia can be regulated by the legislation of other countries is not correct,” ROTsIT said in a statement in December announcing its complaint. Owned by Google Inc., YouTube is headquartered in California state of the US.
Earlier too, Russian authorities sued five social media platforms for failing to delete posts urging children to take part in illegal protests, the Interfax news agency cited a Moscow court. Twitter, Google, and Facebook each have three cases against them, with each violation punishable by a fine of up to 4 million rubles (around $54,000), and cases have also been filed against TikTok and Telegram, the report said. As per a Reuters report, the cases were opened after protests nationwide over last month’s jailing of Alexei Navalny, a prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin.
Read more: Behave yourself or get out – Russia sends the first and final warning to American Big Tech
Meanwhile, the Russian government was also upping the ante against Big Tech by not just taking on it at a domestic level, but also vowing to wage an international campaign against it alongside like-minded countries. As per a TASS report, the speaker of the Russian State Duma (lower house of parliament) Vyacheslav Volodin said on Monday that fighting Big Tech’s arbitrariness on the internet and protection of the countries’ digital sovereignty need to be discussed on the international level.
Now even with multiple warnings the big tech is not learning its lessons and playing down the damage that Russia can inflict. However, if Youtube keeps up its act, then Putin might even ban Youtube from the Russian internet once and for all. The regulator said it had launched the probe after receiving a complaint from the Regional Public Centre for Internet Technologies (ROTsIT), a group presenting itself as defending the interests of Russian internet users.
Alexei Navalny has been using the platform for years to release inquiries into corruption as well as protest calls that have received millions of views.
On Sunday, his team released a new video calling for mass demonstrations across Russia on Wednesday evening in support of Navalny, who is currently on a hunger strike in a penal colony, seeking proper medical attention for a variety of ailments. Nearly three million people have watched the video so far.
Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, said on Twitter on Monday that she had received an email from YouTube informing her that Roskomnadzor had requested the video to be removed because it was illegal under Russian law. These developments should be seen seriously and going forward, if Youtube does not respect the Russian law, Putin might ban it in Russia.
