The current war between Russia and Ukraine has now taken its effect on Social Media capability.

Tik Tok, the Chinese-owned social media platform declared on March 13, that it had banned live streaming and uploading of new content from Russia. This action was taken after Russia’s executive branch, the Kremlin, officially criminalized the spreading of what they labeled to be fake news regarding its invasion of Ukraine.

Global news media outlets temporarily suspended their reporting in Russia following this law finalized by National Legislation. This was done to protect Journalists who are now threatened with up to 15 years of jail time for spreading “fake news” related to the war.

Following this development, Tik Tok executed the order to ban the creation of Russian-made content. However, the video-sharing app is allowing Russian-made content created before the act to remain uploaded. 

Tik Tok released a statement on Twitter expressing their point of view, “In light of Russia’s new ‘fake news’ law, we have no choice but to suspend live-streaming and new content to our video service while we review the safety implications of this law,”

Tracking Exposed, an online company that aims to analyze platforms algorithms and operations found another detail. The company discovered that Tik Tok is censoring far more content than initially declared. 

The platform is also blocking access to most foreign accounts such as content from American and European users. Tracking Exposed used VPNs and Russian IP addresses to try and access non-Russian content from Tik Tok. The company found that no videos from European and American accounts were available in Russia, this included institutions such as the World Health Organization and the United Nations. None of the 10 most-followed global TikTok accounts were accessible.

Russia’s communication regulator, Roskomnadzor made the executive decision to ban Instagram as a whole. The Federal agency gave the people and influencers a 48 hour grace period to say farewell to their followers.

How will this affect social media influencers and celebrities who depend on these platforms to fuel their content? Russian reality TV star and influencer, Olga Buova expressed her feelings towards the social media ban. Buova states, “I feel like a large part of my life is being taken away”. Buova shared her thoughts on the matter through a video she posted before the platforms were taken down.

Russia made the decision to get rid of the platform due to the action that Meta made in allowing posts calling for violence against Russians. The US-based company made an exception to its policy inciting violence so long as it expressed political opposition to Russian forces. Meta made it clear that messages instructing animosity towards normal Russian citizens would remain prohibited.

Although this change does not directly affect anyone within our community, it still left some local students pondering. Sonoma State student, Clint Soderer explained his thoughts on the social media bans in Russia, “It’s a bummer that this war has now found a new way to affect innocent people, however, it may be effective in limiting Russia’s ability to flip the narrative.” 

People can only hope that this development in Russia’s social media usage somehow pushes this war between Russia and Ukraine in a positive direction.