Russia threatened on Wednesday to block Alphabet Inc. s YouTube after German broadcaster RT deleted its German channels and said it was considering retaliating against Russian media.
YouTube said on Tuesday that RT's channels had breached its COVID - 19 Misinformation Policy, a move by Russia's Foreign Ministry as unprecedented information aggression Russian state radio operator Roskomnadzor said it had written to Google and demanded that the restrictions be lifted. It said Russia could attempt to fully or partially restricted all of YouTube access if it failed to comply.
The Kremlin said it would force YouTube to comply with Russia's law saying there could be zero tolerance for breaches.
Certainly there are signs that the laws of the Russian Federation have been broken, broken very clearly, because of course this involves censorship and obstructing the dissemination of information by media, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
The Foreign Ministry said Germany authorities had been approached with a proposal to develop and take retaliatory measures against the YouTube hosting service and the Russian media. Christian Mihr, executive director of Reporters Without Borders RSF Germany, said the threat of action against foreign journalists was entirely inappropriate and corrective. Russia has increased pressure on foreign tech firms over the past year, fining social media companies for failing to delete content Russia deem illegal and punitively slowing down the speed of Twitter.
That pressure led Google and Apple to remove an anti-government tactical voting app from their stores on the first day of parliamentary elections earlier this month, Kremlin critics said.
Berlin denied an allegation by the German Foreign Ministry that The YouTube decision had been made with clear and tacit support from the Russian authorities and local media.
It is a decision by YouTube, based on rules created by YouTube. It is not a move taken by the German government or other official organisations, according to German Government spokesperson Steffen Seibert.