The Russian legislation can be changed to allow stricter sanctions on foreign IT companies, including the blockade of Google, which repeatedly violates the country’s laws, warned the Russian telecoms regulator Roskomnadzor.
Earlier this week, Google was fined 500,000 rubles (€ 6,550) for refusing to connect its search engine to the federal database of prohibited websites. The punishment looks like mockery, considering that the Alphabet Holding, to which Google belongs, has generated almost 97 billion euros last year.
„If the fines have no impact on the behavior of the foreign company, there is a possibility that the legislation will be changed, which will block Google in Russia,“ said Vadim Subbotin, deputy head of Roskomnadzor.
„Blocking will become the toughest possible action,“ but it would be justified to consider the content of the forbidden websites to which Google allows its users free access, Subbotin said.
We talk about child pornography, suicide, drugs, gambling, alcohol sales. We speak of extremism and terrorism.
In Russia, a new law was passed in October this year requiring all search engine operators to exclude terrorist, extremist and other illegal websites from their search results.
To this end, they should connect to a database containing around 120,000 forbidden URLs, which was created by the Russian authorities.
However, Google refuses to filter the illegal content, although Roskomnadzor held several meetings with representatives of the US technology giant and explained the legal situation to them.
Already in September, the regulator threatened to block Facebook in Russia, as the company violated the ban on storing personal data of Russian citizens on servers outside the country.
