Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp were fined 36 million rubles in Russia for refusing to localize user data. WhatsApp received a fine for the first time

The magistrate of the court district 422 of the Tagansky district of Moscow fined Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter in the total amount of 36 million rubles for the fact that they did not localize the personal data of citizens in Russia. WhatsApp was fined 4 million rubles, informs Roskomnadzor.

This is the first fine imposed by a Russian court against the WhatsApp messenger for an offense under Part 8 of Art. 13.11 of the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation, which for legal entities involves a punishment of 1 to 6 million rubles.

Facebook was fined 15 million rubles, and Twitter – 17 million rubles for repeated violations. Last year, social networks were already fined 4 million rubles each.

On the eve of Twitter and Facebook challenged in the appellate instance the fines imposed by the magistrate for failure to remove the content prohibited in the Russian Federation. The date of the court hearings has not yet been set.

On July 22, the same court fined Facebook 6 million rubles under two protocols for not removing prohibited content. The representatives of the companies did not come to court, the case was considered without them.

In May, the court fined Facebook under eight protocols 26 million rubles for failure to remove prohibited content, in June – another 17 million rubles. Since the beginning of the year, Facebook has been fined a total of 64 million rubles.

Under the same article on the same day, July 22, the Moscow Magistrates’ Court found Twitter guilty and imposed a fine of 5.5 million rubles. Prior to that, the company was also fined several times and the total amount of fines received by Twitter since the beginning of this year amounted to 50 million rubles.

In the spring, Roskomnadzor also announced plans to impose fines for failing to remove calls for teenagers to go to uncoordinated actions on TikTok, VKontakte, Telegram, Odnoklassniki, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Most of the protocols were reviewed by the courts.