The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) of Russia has issued orders to stop the distribution of inappropriate advertising to Yandex and Google. Also, companies face administrative fines ranging from 100 to 500 thousand rubles ($1.3-6.4 thousand).
In March 2020, an advertisement for a dietary supplement Gaia Herbs was displayed in Yandex.Direct and Google AdWords with a hyperlink to the site for purchasing the drug.
It turned out that the product contains Kava pepper (piper methysticum), which belongs to the list of potent substances, and its production, advertising, and distribution is prohibited in Russia.
Therefore, the FAS concluded that Yandex and Google as distributors violated the law on advertising by not properly checking the advertising message.