FILE PHOTO: An illuminated Google logo is seen inside an office building in Zurich, Switzerland December 5, 2018. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann/
LONDON (Reuters) – Fines imposed by Russian courts on Alphabet’s Google and YouTube, Meta, TikTok and Telegram appear to have been settled as the companies are no longer registered as debtors in the state bailiffs’ database.
But the database, accessed by Reuters on Wednesday, still includes X (formerly Twitter) and Twitch, with fines totalling 51 million roubles ($560,730) and 23 million roubles ($252,879), respectively.
Google, Meta, TikTok and Telegram did not immediately respond to requests for comment. State bailiffs could not immediately be reached.
Russia has been at loggerheads with foreign technology companies over what it deems unlawful content and a failure to store user data locally, in simmering disputes that intensified after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
Following the invasion, Twitter and Meta Platforms’ Facebook and Instagram were blocked, and Google-owned YouTube became a particular target of the Russian state’s ire.
In late 2023, a Russian court imposed a fine against Google of 4.6 billion roubles ($50.4 million), calculated as a proportion of its annual turnover in Russia. Meta, which was labelled as “extremist” in 2022, has also been subjected to fines as a proportion of its Russian revenue.
($1 = 91.2575 roubles)
(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
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