A Moscow court has fined the Spotify music service 500,000 rubles for refusing to localize Russian user data in the country, TASS reports. The amount of the fine was below the minimum of 1 million provided for by the article.
“The court ruled that Spotify AB was found guilty under Part 8 of Art. 13.11 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation and impose a fine of 500 thousand rubles,” judge Timur Vakhrameev read out the decision. This paragraph of the article provides for liability for refusal to store user data on servers in Russia. The court heeded the request of the representative of the company to limit itself to a warning or to impose a fine below the minimum limit.
Previously, Zoom, Apple, Twitch, Pinterest, Airbnb, Snapchat, Tinder and others received fines under this article, and in some cases the amounts were several times higher than Spotify. In total, last year Roskomnadzor revealed 46 cases of violation of the law on personal data.
The Spotify service announced its withdrawal from Russia in March and stopped working in the country on April 11. The company recently published its second-quarter financial report, which shows that the total number of premium subscribers of the service grew by 14% (to 188 million), even despite the disconnection of another 600,000 users from Russia in April.
The positive trend was supported by strong performance in Latin America and Europe. The total number of active users per month increased to 422 million (up 19%). At the same time, the revenue of the service turned out to be higher than expected. It grew by 23% year-on-year (to €2.9 billion). Revenue from premium subscriptions grew by 22% year-on-year (to €2.5 billion). Advertising revenue grew 31% yoy to €360m, hitting a record high as a percentage of total revenue of 13% in the second quarter.
bbabo.Net