The freeze on Google's bank account is a result of the company's ongoing tug-of-war over what the Russian government considers problematic content on its platforms.
“The Russian authorities' seizure of Google Russia's bank account 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,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement to CNN Business.
Even as its business operations come to a close, Google says it plans to continue offering its free services – such as YouTube, Search, Maps, and Gmail – to Russia internet users.
Google Moves Employees Out of Russia - WSJ. News Corp is a global, diversified media and information services company focused on creating and distributing authoritative and engaging content and other products and services.
The move came after a Russian regulator demanded that the company stop showing ads with what the regulator claimed was false information about the invasion of Ukraine.
Google Workspace is available in most countries and regions. However, Google restricts access to some of its business services in certain countries or regions, such as Crimea, Cuba, the so-called Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republic, Iran, North Korea, and Syria.
A popular search engine, most services offered by Google China were blocked by the Great Firewall in the People's Republic of China. In 2010, searching via all Google search sites, including Google Mobile, was moved from mainland China to Hong Kong. Google Information Technology (China) Co., .
Microsoft has stopped selling its products and services in Russia, following the country's invasion of Ukraine. Major tech companies including Apple and Dell have made similar decisions.
Google, which has paused ad sales and most other commercial operations in Russia, said its free services, including Gmail, Maps, Android and Play, would remain available for Russian users.
As of 2020, 122,488,468 (85% of the country's total population) were Internet users. As of September 2020, Russia ranked 47th among the world's countries by the fixed broadband Internet access speed, with an average download speed of 75.91 mbit/s, and 88th by the mobile network Internet access speed with 22.83 mbit/s.
YouTube is now available in Russia.
A TV channel owned by a sanctioned Russian businessman said in April that bailiffs had seized 1 billion roubles ($15 million) from Google over its failure to restore access to its YouTube account, but this is the first time the U.S. tech giant has said its bank account as whole has been seized.
Yandex LLC (Russian: Яндекс) is a Russian multinational technology company providing Internet-related products and services, including an Internet search engine, information services, e-commerce, transportation, maps and navigation, mobile applications, and online advertising.
A court in Moscow has rejected an appeal by Google against an order to pay a fine of more than 21.7 billion rubles ($352 million) over information distributed about Russia's ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine on its YouTube video-sharing platform.
Instagram is currently banned in Russia, but you can bypass Russian censorship geoblocks and access the full features of Instagram with a virtual private network (VPN). In our book, ExpressVPN is the best VPN for that purpose, but NordVPN and CyberGhost are cheaper alternatives.
Russia defaulted on part of its foreign currency denominated debt on June 27, 2022 (because the money got stuck in Euroclear), its first such default since 1918 (in 1998 it was ruble-denominated bonds).
Despite the global dominance of Google as a primary search engine, Russian consumers gave their preference to homegrown Yandex and Mail.ru.
"We are supporting humanitarian efforts, providing aid for the unfolding refugee crisis, and doing all we can to support our teams in the region." Apple's move means that people in Russia will no longer be able to purchase items like iPhones or Macbooks direct from the company.
On March 2, 2022, Apple, among others, officially announced the suspension of sales in Russia. Since then, the official Apple Online Store has been unavailable in the country, all shipments of devices have been stopped, and Apple Pay has been blocked.
Russia's System of Operational-Investigatory Measures (SORM) requires telecommunications operators to install hardware provided by the Federal Security Service (FSB). It allows the agency to unilaterally monitor users' communications metadata and content, including phone calls, email traffic and web browsing activity.
Google pulled its search engine from China in 2010 because of heavy government internet censorship. Since then, Google has had a difficult relationship with the Chinese market. The end of Google Translate in China marks a further retreat by the U.S. technology giant from the world's second-largest economy.
Google China's search engine was launched in 2006 and abruptly pulled from mainland China in 2010 amid a major hack of the company and disputes over censorship of search results.
Google, Facebook and Twitter are all blocked in China due to the country's Great Firewall. They can usually only be accessed via virtual private networks or VPNs.
Baidu is China's largest and most widely used search engine, much like Google in the U.S.
In the six months ending May 2022, the United States accounted for 26.9 percent of traffic to online search website Google.com. India was ranked second, accounting for 4.5 percent of web visits to the platform.