A failed Youtube clone owned by Gazprom-Media has admitted to sharing its users’ personal data.
The Gazprom-Media-owned video hosting Rutube, which in February estimated its audience at 77 million people, transfers “all the data” of its users to the Russian state. This was announced by Alena Kuzmina, head of the platform’s department for work with public opinion leaders.
Answering a question about Rutube’s cooperation with law enforcement agencies at the Safe Internet Forum, she said that employees of the moderation department send collected information about users to the “security service department.” “The security service department passes everything to the prosecutor’s office. <...> All the data we have – ip, mail, phone number – we pass everything,” Sota quoted Kuzmina as saying.
Rutube, which was launched in 2006, is part of Gazprom-Media’s media assets and is positioned as an analog of the American YouTube. It is managed by Ruform LLC, 100% of which was consolidated by the holding at the end of 2020. Before YouTube was actually blocked in Russia in 2024, the platform, according to data.ai service, was only in the third ten App Store downloads in the Russian Federation.
After the war in Ukraine began, Apple demanded that Rutube hide Russian propaganda media materials in the iOS version of the app or make it available only in Russia under threat of removal from the AppStore. The video hosting chose the second option, but in the summer of 2024 the app was still removed. In October 2024, Google Play service did the same. The management of Rutube said that it “suddenly became a ‘Hollywood exclusive'”, as the application due to “confusion” was allegedly available only in the U.S.
In February the site was blocked in Turkey under the pretext of illegal distribution of casino and gambling advertisements, in April the Russian video hosting stopped working on the territory of Uzbekistan in accordance with the government decree obliging to limit the work of resources with content that promotes violence, war, hostility and terrorism. Earlier, in October 2024, it became known about the blocking of the service in Moldova.
In March, Deputy General Director of Gazprom-Media Sergey Kosinsky said that in the month of March, Gazprom-Media’s Deputy Director General Sergey Kosinsky said that the monthly audience of Rutube in February increased by 72% year-on-year, reaching 77 million users (in November the figure was 70.5 million). Total viewing time, he said, has increased more than six times.