Russia fines Twitter $116,778 for failure to remove content

A Russian court has fined Twitter $116,778 for violating the country's Internet legislation by failing to remove a banned content .

According to Russia's TASS News Agency, Moscow's Tagansky District Court handed Twitter a total of 8.9 million rubles in fines ($116,778) for refusing to delete tweets urging minors to join an unauthorised and illegitimate event. Twitter has 60 days to pay the fine from the day the ruling comes into force.

Last month, Russia's telecom watchdog Roskomnadzor started to limit Twitter's traffic due to its failure to remove banned content, and warned about the possibility of completely blocking the micro-blogging site.

In response,Twitter had announced to establish a legal entity in Turkey to continue operating there under the country's internet law that came into place last year.

"We will continue to work to protect the public conversation in Turkey, empowering people to have access to that conversation, and advocating for our values," the micro-blogging platform said.

India has also raised similar demands from Twitter to keep its platform cleaned for meaningful conversations and remove bad accounts. The Indian government in February had announced new stringent guidelines for social media platforms along with code of ethics for over-the-top (OTT) platforms and digital media.

Accordingly, the social media platforms will be classified under two categories -- social media intermediaries and significant social media intermediaries -- with the latter being subject to greater obligations.

The new Intermediary Liability Rules had asked social media companies with over 5 million users in India to not only enable traceability of end-to-end encrypted messages but also establish local offices with senior officials to deal with law enforcement and user grievances.