A Moscow court on Monday banned Facebook and Instagram for what it deemed “extremist activity” in a case against their parent company, Meta, The Associated Press reported.
The Tverskoy District Court fulfilled a request from prosecutors to outlaw Meta Platforms Inc. and banned Facebook and Instagram. Russian prosecutors have accused the social media platforms of ignoring government requests to remove what they described as fake news about Russian military actions in Ukraine and calls for anti-war protests in Russia.
Monday’s court ruling bans Meta from opening offices and doing business in Russia. Meta declined to comment when contacted by The Associated Press.
Prosecutors haven’t requested to ban the Meta-owned messaging service WhatsApp, which is widely popular in Russia. The authorities also emphasized that they do not intend to punish individual Russians who use Facebook or Instagram.
Earlier this month, Russia's communications regulator blocked Facebook in response to what it said were restrictions of access to Russian media on its platform.
The regulator, Roskomnadzor, said there had been 26 cases of discrimination against Russian media by Facebook since October 2020, with access restricted to state-backed channels like RT and the RIA news agency.
In addition to blocking Facebook and Instagram, Russian authorities also have shut access to foreign media websites, including BBC, the US government-funded Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, German broadcaster Deutsche Welle and Latvia-based website Meduza.
Meta was one of several companies that took action against Russia at the start of the war in Ukraine, announcing that it would be restricting access to Russian state-controlled media in Europe, including RT and Sputnik, following “requests from a number of governments and the EU.”
Meta added that content from Russia state-controlled media would be demoted on Facebook and Instagram, and that links from those outlets would be labeled in order to give “context” to people who do access them.
Nathaniel Gleicher, Meta’s head of security policy, also announced that Facebook would allow Ukrainian users to lock their social media profiles for added security.