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Google failed to remove over 2,600 illegal materials by early October — lawmaker

Vasily Piskaryov recalled that, during the meeting with the company's management in April, this number stood at over 5,700

MOSCOW, October 25. /TASS/. By October 1, Google has still failed to remove over 2,600 materials containing illegal information, with 2,500 materials uploaded to YouTube, says Russian State Duma Committee on Security and Countering Corruption head Vasily Piskaryov said during a meeting with Google management on Monday.

"By October 1, the total number of unremoved illegal content on Google platforms is about 2,650 materials, 2,500 of them [uploaded to] YouTube, and over 150 [uploaded] to other Google resources," Piskaryov said.

The lawmaker reminded that, during the last meeting with Google management in April, this number stood at over 5,700, adding that "a job has been done, but it is far from being ideal."

According to Piskaryov, the unremoved illegal content includes calls for suicide, drug propaganda, videos aimed at involvement of minors in illegal activities, extremist information and a ‘huge number’ of materials with illegal calls for mass events and riots, materials of organizations deemed undesirable in Russia, insults to state symbols and fakes.

"We expect Google to remove the illegal content and satisfy the numerous orders to pay fines for existing legal complaints. Millions worth of fines for non-removal of the illegal content remain unpaid," the lawmaker said.

The senior lawmaker also inquired how ready Google is to open an office in Moscow, which, under the Russian law, must start operating on January 1, 2022.

Earlier, Federal Service for Supervision in Telecom, Information Technologies and Mass Communications (Roskomnadzor) head Vadim Subbotin stated that his agency intends to fine Google for repeat failure to remove illegal content with turnover fines (calculated as a percentage of Google’s turnover) In mid-September he also said the agency intends to apply turnover fines to Google, Facebook and Twitter.