Meta was found guilty of “extremist activity” by a Moscow court on Monday, but the judgment will not affect its WhatsApp chat service, instead focusing on the US Company’s already-banned Facebook and Instagram social networks.
Meta did not reply to demands for comment after the Tverskoi District Court in Moscow announced in a news release that it had upheld a complaint filed by state prosecutors to prohibit the company from conducting business in Russia.
According to the Interfax news agency, Meta’s lawyer Victoria Shakina had previously informed the court that the company was not involved in extremist activities and was opposed to Russophobia.
It was unclear whether Meta will file an appeal against Russia’s ban on Facebook and Instagram, “”on the grounds of realizing extremist activity”, a ban TASS cited Judge Olga Solopova as saying would be enforced immediately.
According to press reports, Russian communications regulator Roskomnadzor announced late Monday that it will remove Meta from the list of foreign firms operating on the Internet in Russia, as well as Instagram and Facebook from the register of social networks.
Roskomnadzor further stated that while disseminating material, Russian media must mark Meta and its social networks as unlawful and must not use their logos.
Russia has previously labelled groups like the Taliban and Islamic State as “extremist,” but has since broadened this to include Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Anti-Corruption Foundation of imprisoned Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.
According to researcher Insider Intelligence, Facebook had 7.5 million users in Russia last year and WhatsApp had 67 million, while Instagram has stated that the ban will effect 80 million users in Russia.
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