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Russian tech giant Yandex removes national borders from Maps app

The reconfiguring of Russia’s digital landscape in the wake of Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine continues to play out at a macro and micro level. Here’s a development on the latter

Google and Meta closing ads in Russia helped Putin, argues Navalny

Jailed Kremlin critic, Alexey Navalny, has hit out at adtech giants Meta and Google for shutting off advertising inside Russia following the country’s invasion of Ukraine which he argues has bee

Anduril is raising up to $1.2B, sources say at a $7B pre-money valuation, for its defense tech

Technology built to improve state resilience — be it in the form of cybersecurity, energy independence, national defense or something else entirely — has come into stronger focus in the wa

Obama says social media is ‘well designed’ to destroy democracies

After an era of open affection for Silicon Valley followed by an era of relative quiet, former President Barack Obama is tearing into tech. The former president spoke Thursday at an event co-hosted by

Kremlin critic Navalny calls for Google and Meta to turn their adtech into an anti-war weapon

Jailed Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny has called on tech giants Google and Meta/Facebook to help circumvent Putin’s grip on the media and get information out to ordinary Russians about what&#8217

As Russians head for the exits, Immigram platform launches to scale professional migration

The number of applications for international visas in the U.K. and elsewhere, in order to leave Russia, has exploded following the latter’s invasion of Ukraine. It’s estimated that since Febru

Alphabet confirms Russia is restricting Google News

In the latest move by Russia to censor Western internet services since it started a war by invading Ukraine, Google has confirmed that Russians are having problems accessing its news aggregator servic

Twitter’s EU-only geoblocks of Russia Today off to a shaky start

Twitter has claimed it’s complying with an EU-wide ban on Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik which came into force yesterday as part of the package of sanctions imposed by the bloc on Russia followin

Ukraine deputy minister talks IT Army and deploying $25M in donated crypto

As the situation continues to unfold in Ukraine with alarming developments, the country has been putting up a resistance to Russia beyond the ground war: It’s been taking the fight to the digita

Google pulls Russia Today, Sputnik from Play Store as EU ban looms

Google has followed Apple’s lead and removed the apps of Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik from its mobile app store, Play, per Reuters. The two Kremlin-linked media outlets were sanctioned in the E

Finland’s Jolla, maker of Sailfish OS, is trying to cut ties with Russia

Jolla, a Finnish startup that develops a mobile Linux-based alternative to Google’s Android which has had some take-up by the Russian government in the past, is looking to restructure its business t

EU confirms ban on Kremlin-backed media is expected to cover online platforms

The EU’s ban on Kremlin-backed media outlets, Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik (plus any subsidiaries), is expected to cover online platforms and apps as well as traditional broadcast channels, Tec

As EU says it’ll ban Russia’s ‘toxic media machine’, social media firms face pressure to act

Late yesterday the European Union announced an “unprecedented” step against Russian disinformation, saying it would ban Kremlin-based media outlets, Russia Today (aka RT) and Sputnik &#821

Reface, a viral face-swap app from Ukraine, adds anti-war push notifications

Reface, an a16z-backed synthetic media app that’s developed out of Ukraine, has added push notifications informing its ~200 million-strong global user-base about Russia’s invasion of the c

Twitter reinstates accounts sharing open source info on Russian military threat

Twitter disclosed that it mistakenly removed a number of accounts sharing details about Russian military activity Wednesday, as the nation’s aggressive posture toward neighboring Ukraine threate

Apple and Google bow to pressure in Russia to remove Kremlin critic’s tactical voting app

Apple and Google have removed from their respective mobile app stores in Russia a tactical voting app created by the organization of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. Earlier this week Reuters rep

Untitled Ventures joins the scramble for Russian & Eastern European startups with a $118M warchest

Sorry Mr. Putin, but there’s a race on for Russian and Eastern European founders. And right now, those awful capitalists in the corrupt West are starting to out-gun the opposition! But seriously…

UK gov’t asleep at the wheel on Russia cyber ops threat, report warns

The UK lacks a comprehensive and cohesive high level strategy to respond to the cyber threat posed by Russia and other hostile states using online disinformation and influence ops to target democratic

Facebook finds and kills another 512 Kremlin-linked fake accounts

Two years on from the U.S. presidential election, Facebook continues to have a major problem with Russian disinformation being megaphoned via its social tools. In a blog post today the company revea

Fake news ‘threat to democracy’ report gets back-burner response from UK gov’t

The UK government has rejected a parliamentary committee’s call for a levy on social media firms to fund digital literacy lessons to combat the impact of disinformation online. The recommendatio
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