Russian government watchdog Roskomnadzor accused Twitter of hosting illegal content and has slowed its access down to users.
The Russian government has disrupted access to Twitter, accusing it of failing to remove banned content as the Kremlin grapples with the role social media is playing in protests against President Vladimir Putin. Russia’s media watchdog Roskomnadzor said Wednesday that the social media giant had ignored more than 28,000 requests since 2017 to take down illegal content. These claims included posts with child pornography, information about drug abuse and calls for minors to commit suicide. The watchdog said that Twitter had shown a “demonstrative disregard of the requirements of the regulator…to remove calls to minors to commit mass suicide on March 3, 2021,” and added that there were over 3,000 illegal posts. In a statement, Roskomnadzor said that if Twitter, “continues to ignore the requirements of the law, restrictive measures will continue…up to blocking.” It has slowed down Twitter content on all mobile devices and half of non-mobile devices in a move it said would mostly impact photo and video content.
