Russia to Impose Search Engine Disclaimers on 5 foreign IT Companies

Russia’s state communications regulator says it is taking punitive measures against five foreign IT companies

Moscow: Russia’s state communications regulator said on Friday it would sanction five foreign IT companies for violating online content laws, which could require search engines to include disclaimers for violations.

Organizer Roskomnadzor says it is taking action against TikTok from ByteDance, messaging service Telegram, Zoom Video Communications Discord chat tool, and Pinterest

Roskomnadzor said in a statement that the measures were in response to the companies’ failure to remove content it described as illegal and would keep it until they comply.

None of the companies immediately responded to written requests for comment.

Roskomnadzor did not specify what actions would be taken. The dominant Yandex search engine gave a disclaimer to some other sites: “Roskomnadzor: the site violates Russian law.”

“Roskomnadzor has decided to take enforcement action … in the form of search engines informing Internet users that the company has violated Russian law,” the organization said.

It has fined several foreign tech companies mostly for failing to remove content they consider illegal. The websites also warned against violating a law passed in early March against “defaming” the armed forces, which carries a prison sentence of up to 15 years.

On Tuesday, a Russian court fined Amazon’s Twitch streaming company 2 million rubles ($33,900) and Telegram 11 million rubles for what Moscow said contained “false” information about events in Ukraine.

Russian lawmakers approved a bill in July that would toughen penalties for foreign internet companies, including a disclaimer for search engines.

(1 US dollar = 59.0000 rubles)

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