Following a slew of sanctions on Russia, Russian organizations, and Russian individuals in response to Russia’s aggressive war in Ukraine, the Russian Foreign Ministry has produced a list of US figures who are now forbidden from visiting Russia – and will remain for the foreseeable future. The list includes high-ranking politicians such as Vice President Kamala Harris, as well as corporate titans such as Mark Zuckerberg and Ryan Roslansky, CEOs of Meta and LinkedIn, respectively, as well as journalists and others with public profiles who are advocating a “Russophobic” agenda.
It’s no surprise that Zuckerberg is the king of social media in the West and the head of networks that Russia has already blocked. But I’m not sure why Roslansky was invited and Twitter’s CEO, Parag Agrawal, was not. In responding to Russian propaganda, Twitter has been as vigorous as Meta’s Facebook, but it remains a profitable conduit for RTing, well, RT. (Of course, the Russian government funds RT.) LinkedIn, on the other hand, has had a long-running spat with Russia, and one of the main side stories of the Ukraine conflict has been the departure of Russians concerned about their liberties and Russia’s Ukrainian and global policies.
The list is also a result of Russia’s actions to shut down or restrict access to a number of Western platforms that do not comply with its information dissemination standards, especially to minimize pro-Russian propaganda. Shutting down Facebook and Instagram, restricting access to Google News, and sending YouTube warnings are among the shutdowns. Meanwhile, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and a slew of other companies have shut down or stopped activities in the nation, in a growing game of whack-a-mole over sanctions imposed as part of the cheval cheval.
Here’s the complete list, but don’t worry if your personal favorites aren’t included. More names are expected to be released soon. Google has revealed that Russians are having trouble accessing its news aggregator service, Google News, in the nation, in the latest attempt by Russia to ban Western internet services since it launched a conflict by invading Ukraine.
This comes after the Interfax news agency reported that Russia’s internet censor, Roskomnadzor, has stopped the service. “We’ve confirmed that certain users in Russia are experiencing trouble accessing the Google News app and website, and that this is not due to any technical difficulties on our end,” a Google spokeswoman told us, implying that the news service is restricted. (A Russian source also informed us that the service had been disabled.)
