Russia said it will impose a fine on US tech giant Google this month which would be a percentage of its annual Russian turnover for consistently failing to delete illegal content. 

Communications regulator Roskomnadzor told Reuters, “Google had failed to pay 32.5 million roubles ($458,100) in penalties levied so far this year and that it would now seek a fine of 5-20% of Google’s Russian turnover, which could reach as much as $240 million, a significant increase.”

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When Reuters contacted Google, they did not respond with a comment immediately.

Russia has started putting increased pressure on foreign tech firms in a bid to practice more control over the internet in the country. This has led to slowing down of the speed of Twitter since March, while the country has been regularly imposing fines on others for content violations.

Following the removal of an anti-government tactical voting app from app store, activists in opposition have accused Alphabet’s Google and Apple of surrendering to Kremlin pressure. 

Roskomnadzor earlier in October said it would “ask a court to impose a turnover fine on social media firm Facebook”. He further cited December 2020 signed legislation by President Vladimir Putin.

“A similar case will be put together in October against Google,” Roskomnadzor said in emailed comments to Reuters on Tuesday. He acknowledged the company’s owned video-hosting site YouTube.

According to the SPARK business database, Google’s turnover in Russia in 2020 was 85.5 billion roubles. This indicated that a 5-20% fine would be between 4.3 and 17.1 billion roubles.

Google is now contesting a court order that requires it to unblock the YouTube account of a sanctioned Russian businessman or face a weekly compounding fine that doubles weekly and could push the company out of business in months if not paid.