Russian watchdog finds Google guilty of casino advertising

The antimonopoly watchdog from Russia has found Google guilty of advertising gambling companies in AdWords.

Russia.- The Moscow directorate of Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) revealed on Thursday that it has found Google guilty of advertising a gambling company in Google AdWords. The watchdog released a statement in which it explains how the ad violated current regulations, Rapsi informed.

FAS detailed that the ads called for online gambling with certain clauses. Currently, gambling advertisement, including online casinos, is prohibited in Russia, the watchdog reiterated in the statement.

Google faces a fine of approximately €6.5k, though there is no other information about the penalty yet.

Not the first time Google advertises in Russia

Back in December 2018, Russian telecom regulatory authority Roskomnadzor fined Google for not removing illegal gambling sites from search results. Besides the €6.5k fine, the authority also blocked 3,000 gambling websites.

Current legislation establishes that all search engines must check a registry of banned sites and remove them from their results. While the registry currently features more than 100k websites, the government is studying the possibility of a new law that would raise the penalties for these types of violations.