President Vladimir Putin said governments should exert influence over social media in the interests of security, pointing to protests in France as justification for greater state oversight of online platforms.
Speaking to representatives of African countries visiting Moscow for the Russia-Africa summit, Putin said French authorities had struggled to control the role of foreign-owned social networks in unrest in their country.
“The French leadership also points out that social media platforms that are not sovereign to France are influencing the events now taking place in major French cities,” Putin said. “They have difficulty influencing how social media operates in their country, or have no influence at all.”
“I think it would be right for all of us to have influence over this and think about security,” he added, without specifying what form that influence should take.
