As Moscow continues to make demands of Big Tech, Russia will continue to slow down the performance of Twitter on mobile devices until all content deemed illegal is removed, according to state communications regulator Roskomnadzor.
Russian authorities have recently made moves to tighten regulation of technology firms by imposing minor fines for content violations, as well as attempting to compel international corporations to establish formal representation in Russia and retain Russians’ personal data on its soil.
According to Roskomnadzor, Twitter has been slowed in Russia since March for tweets including child pornography, drug addiction information, or calls for kids to commit suicide.
Twitter, which did not respond to a request for comment on Monday, claims that it does not allow its platform to be used to promote unlawful activity.
It claims to have a zero-tolerance policy for child sexual exploitation and for encouraging people to commit suicide or self-harm.
On mobile devices, videos and photographs load substantially slower, but Roskomnadzor removed speed limitations on fixed networks in May.
Twitter, which has been fined a total of 38.4 million roubles ($511,900) this year, has persistently ignored demands to remove forbidden material since 2014, according to Roskomnadzor, but has taken down more than 90% of illegal tweets.
“As of now, 761 undeleted posts remain,” Roskomnadzor said in response to Reuters questions. “The condition for lifting the access restriction on mobile devices is that Twitter completely removes banned materials detected by Roskomnadzor.”
For repeated legal transgressions, the regulator has threatened to penalise Alphabet’s Google and Facebook based on their yearly turnover in Russia, threats that the two corporations did not respond to at the time.
“We also reiterate that the social network Twitter has been repeatedly found guilty by a Russian court of committing administrative offences,” Roskomnadzor said.
