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MOSCOW: Russia has said it was partially limiting access to Meta Platforms Inc’s Facebook, accusing it of “censoring” Russian media, announcing the measure a day after Moscow invaded Ukraine and the latest in a series of steps against US social media giants.
Russia’s media regulator, Roskomnadzor, claimed Facebook had “restricted the official accounts” of four Russian media outlets that are state-owned or state-affiliated: Zvezda TV channel, RIA Novosti news agency, Lenta.ru and Gazeta.ru.
Roskomnadzor said Facebook’s actions violated federal law and that its owner, Meta, ignored a request from the agency to remove the restrictions. The agency added that it “has recorded 23 cases of such censorship of Russian media and internet resources by Facebook” since October 2020.
Moscow has also increased pressure on domestic media, threatening to block reports that contain what it describes as “false information” regarding its military operation in Ukraine, where Russian missiles were pounding Kyiv.
Meta’s head of global affairs, Nick Clegg, said in a statement: “Yesterday, Russian authorities ordered us to stop the independent fact-checking and labelling of content posted to Facebook by four Russian state-owned media organizations. We refused. As a result, they have announced they will be restricting the use of our services.”
Meta, which has long been under pressure to combat misinformation, partners with outside fact-checkers, including Reuters, which assess some content for veracity. Meta says that content rated false, altered or partly false is shown to fewer users.
Clegg said “ordinary Russians” were using Meta’s apps — which include Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, as well as Facebook — to “express themselves and organize for action” and that the company wanted them to continue to do so.
Russia has been trying to exert tighter control over the internet and big tech for years, something critics say threatens individual and corporate freedom, and is part of a wider crackdown against outspoken opponents of the Kremlin.
US Senator Mark Warner said in a letter to the chief executives of Facebook, YouTube and others that the companies have a duty to ensure their social media platforms are not misused by Russia and Russia-linked entities.
Alphabet Inc’s Google said it has removed hundreds of YouTube channels and thousands of videos over the last few days for violating its policies and was continuing to look for and disrupt disinformation campaigns and hacking.
Twitter Inc said users in Russia and Ukraine would no longer see ads – an attempt to avoid distracting from public safety messages – and that they would not get recommended tweets from accounts they do not follow in a bid to limit the spread of abusive content.
It was not immediately clear what Russia’s restrictions on Facebook would involve. Last year Moscow slowed down the speed of Twitter in a punitive move.
