Putin Signs New Internet Law, Forces Big Tech to Open Russian Offices

On Thursday, President Vladimir Putin has signed a law that obliges foreign social media and internet giants to open offices in Russia. This move is the latest of series to exert greater control over Big Tech.

Putin Signs New Internet Law, Big Tech to Open Russian Offices or Leave

Since the fiasco related to a certain political opponent of Putin, the Kremlin is keen to strengthen its control of the internet. Particularly, it wants to stem what Russia deems as illegal protests, organized using foreign social media.

Already, on Putin's orders, Moscow has fined firms for failing to delete content it says is illegal. In case of Twitter, the Kremlin slowed down the speed of the website as punishment. In case of Google, the US-based tech giant is facing a new case for breaching personal data legislation.

The new law states, "a foreign entity, carrying out activities on the internet in Russia, is obliged to create a branch, open an office or establish a Russian legal entity". Alexander Khinshtein said the law applied to internet giants with a daily audience in Russia of at least 500,000 people. He is head of the information policy and IT committee at the State Duma, Russia's lower house of parliament. On his Telegram channel, Khinshtein further wrote that the firms must register a personal account on the website of Roskomnadzor, Russia's state communications regulator.

Russia will seek to impose penalties on companies that violate the legislation. These penalties can include advertising bans. The Kremlin has moved against social media companies, as they do not delete content Putin and Moscow deem illegal quickly. As such, Facebook , Google, Telegram and Twitter all have court hearings scheduled for later this month. All these internet giants are facing new charges from Kremlin.

RIA reported that this new law will affect retailers and ecommerce companies as well. This will take the number of total affected companies to around 20.