Amid Conflict With Ukraine, Russia Blocks Facebook Alleging Discrimination Against Russian State Media

Meta’s head of global affairs, Nick Clegg said that the company would continue to do everything it could to restore its services.

Representational Image (Photo: Getty Images)

New Delhi: Amidst the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Moscow on Saturday announced that it is blocking popular social media platform Facebook. The country’s communications regulator said that this came in response to the restrictions of access to Russian media platforms.

According to a report by news agency Reuters, the communications regulator, Roskomnadzor, said that there have been 26 cases of discrimination against Russian media by Meta Inc’s Facebook since October 2020, including state-backed channels like RT and the RIA news agency.

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In an alarming censorship, #Russia has blocked access to #Facebook in the country. In response, its parent company #Meta has paused all ads in Russia. #RussiaUkraineWar #RussiaUkraineConflict #RussiaUkraineCrisis

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- IANS (@IANS) 5 Mar 2022

Meta’s head of global affairs, Nick Clegg said that the company would continue to do everything it could to restore its services.

"Soon millions of ordinary Russian will find themselves cut off from reliable information, deprived of their everyday ways of connecting with family and friends and silenced from speaking out," he said, in a Twitter post.

In a blog, Meta stated that it is trying to keep its services available, however, it has stopped showing ads to users in Russia, and has barred Russian advertisers from running ads globally “due to the difficulties of operating in Russia at this time."

Other tech companies like Alphabet Inc’s Google have also stopped running Russian ads across their platforms. 

Last week, Russia had said that it partially restricted access to Facebook.  As per Meta Inc, it came after the company refused a government request to stop independent fact-checking of several Russian state media outlets.

On Saturday, Twitter also said that its services were being restricted for some Russian users.

The tensions in the tech world have flared up after the February 24 invasion of Ukraine by Russia. Post the Russian aggression, the tech giants have come under pressure to respond to it. Russia is currently under sanctions by most of the western nations including the US and the EU.