Moscow, Jul 1 (FN Bureau) Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday signed a law obliging global IT giants to establish their offices in Russia, according to the document published on the official portal for legal information. The law affects companies with a daily audience of more than 500,000 Russian users, and also applies to hosting providers, advertising system operators and other internet services. According to Alexander Khinshtein, the chairman of the Russian lower house’s information policy committee, some 20 entities, including AliExpress, Gmail, and Ikea, have already been put on the list of companies required to open offices in the country.
The full list will be published on the official website of the Russian media watchdog, Roskomnadzor. Under the law, owners of such information resources are required to create branches, representative offices or other legal entities in Russia in order to continue their operation. This measure will allow IT giants to fully represent their interests in the country and establish a channel of communication with Russian regulators. The law will enter into force on January 1, 2022. The law envisions a set of measures to punish violators, ranging from imposing certain restrictions to limiting access to the resource or its complete blockage. As such, IT companies that fail to comply with the law may face a ban on advertising and search results, restrictions on transfer of funds from Russian citizens, as well as a ban on the gathering and international transfer of personal data.