MUMBAI, INDIA: Following a tightening of Russian regulatory procedures, Google has announced the closure of its development center in St. Petersburg.
Google Russia had been working on the Google Toolbar and Google Code Search projects, among other initiatives.
Chinese agency Xinhua reported that legal changes in 2014 required Google to house all data pertaining to Russian citizens on servers located within the Russian Federation.
However, Google defended its move and said that the announcement was as a part of a normal optimization process taking place not only in Russia, but also in Finland, Sweden and the US.”
It also said that the St. Petersburg staff would continue working on Google projects in other offices.