Google Russia Has Declared Bankruptcy

Following the seizure of its bank account by authorities, Google’s Russian branch filed a notice of intention to declare bankruptcy. A Google spokesperson told a reliable source, that this “has made it untenable for our Russia office to function, including employing and paying Russia-based employees, paying suppliers and vendors, and meeting other financial obligations.”

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, Google, like many other corporations, ceased most of its commercial activity in Russia. Despite this and the bankruptcy case, it will continue to give free services including Google Search, YouTube, Gmail, Maps, and Android to Russians for the time being.

Russia penalized Google $82,000 in May of last year for failing to erase thousands of pieces of unlawful content. In December, authorities fined the company around $98 million for similar reasons. This is anticipated to constitute roughly 5.7 percent of Google’s revenue in Russia in 2021

Roskomnadzor, Russia’s telecoms regulator, has been pressuring YouTube to relax restrictions on access to Russian media in recent months. Last month, a Russian TV broadcaster said that bailiffs seized around 1 billion rubles (nearly $15 million) from Google when the company refused to restore the station’s access to its YouTube account.

While Russia has blocked numerous other platforms and services, including Google News, it does not presently have intentions to block YouTube access in the country. Residents will undoubtedly suffer as a result of such a move, it stated this week. According to the source, the streaming site has over 90 million Russian users.

Russia’s digital development minister has stated that the government intends to remain linked to the global network while testing its own, closed-off version of the internet.