Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, Mar 5: Russia has prohibited access to Facebook in the country in an alarming censorship. As a result, the company’s parent company, Meta, has halted all advertising in Russia.
Advertisements targeting Russians will be suspended, according to Meta, due to the limitations of operating in Russia at this time, and “advertisers within Russia will no longer be able to publish or run ads anywhere in the globe, including within Russia.”
According to Meta, millions of regular Russians will be cut off from credible information as a result of the Russian government’s decision to block access to Facebook in the Russian Federation, “deprived of their everyday ways of communicating with family and friends and silenced from speaking out.”
“We will continue to do everything we can to restore our services so they remain available to people to safely and securely express themselves and organise for action,” Meta said in a statement.
Roskomnadzor, Russia’s communications watchdog, restricted access to Facebook on Friday, alleging 26 cases of ‘discrimination by Facebook against Russian media and information resources’ since October 2020.
Earlier on Friday, the Russian legislature passed a new law prohibiting the dissemination of ‘false news’ about the country’s military forces, which could result in a prison sentence of up to 15 years.
The BBC said that it would halt journalistic operations in the country shortly after the measure was passed.
Google, Twitter, and Snapchat have all paused ads in Russia, and Facebook is the latest to do so.
