The censorship agency continues silencing services that let users share unchecked content about war in Ukraine.

Roskomnadzor, Russia’s information censorship agency, has restricted access to the Viber messenger due to alleged violations of Russian legislation on dissemination of "unlawful content."

According to Roskomnadzor, Viber fails to meet requirements necessary to "prevent threats of using the messenger for terrorist and extremist purposes," recruitment of citizens, and the "distribution of illegal information."

“Access to the Viber service is restricted due to its non-compliance with Russian legal requirements for organizers of information dissemination, which are aimed at preventing the use of the messenger for terrorism, extremism, citizen recruitment, drug sales, and the distribution of unlawful content,” the agency said in a Telegram post.

To operate in Russia, messenger and chat services must register with Roskomnadzor and open a local office. They are also obliged under Russian laws to share users’ personal data and user-generated content with the Federal Security Service (FSB), in violation to their own privacy policy.

Viber - officially known as Rakuten Viber Messenger" - was launched in December 2010 by an Israel-based firm. It works similarly as Meta’s WhatsApp and runs virtually the same features. In 2014, it was acquired by the Japanese holding Rakuten.

In January 2022, Viber's owner, Viber Media S.a r.l., a company registered in Luxembourg, established a representative office in Russia and has complied with all legal requirements.

Yet it has been fined at least twice: in June 2023, the company was fined 1 million rubles for refusing to remove information about the war in Ukraine deemed false by Russian authorities, and in March 2023, it paid 800,000 rubles for allowing the publication of “prohibited content.”

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