As Russia pounded the Ukraine, many Western countries including the U.S. and Europe passed tough sanctions on several Russian companies. By Friday, social media company Meta stopped monetization on its Facebook and Instagram app by top Russian media companies. Twitter is also monitoring the information flow on its app and Elon Musk has offered Starlink internet connectivity to Ukraine, after being asked for it by Mykhailo Fedorov. Now, the country is asking private tech such as Apple to do its part.

On Friday, Mykhailo Fedorov, who is the Ukrainian Minister of digital transformation, posted on Twitter that he had asked Tim Cook, CEO of Apple to block its App Store for Russian citizens and to stop the sale of Apple devices and products for users in Russia.

Fedorov, who is also the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine said that such actions from Apple would motivate the youth and active population in Russia to “proactively stop the disgraceful military aggression.”

Apple plays a major role in the smartphone category in Russia. It is the third most popular brand in the country with a 15 percent market share while Xiaomi has 26 percent and Samsung has the largest share at 34 percent.

On February 25, Apple CEO Tim Cook said that he was “deeply concerned” about the happenings in Ukraine and that their teams “will be supporting local humanitarian efforts.” He said that he was thinking of the people who were “in harm’s way” and joined all those who were calling for peace.

The Apple App store is operating in Russia. However, Apple Pay is not working as the U.S. government has sanctioned banks. Earlier, Business Insider reported that Russia’s central bank said that customers of banks that have been hit by sanctions have not been able to use both Apple Pay and Google Pay.

On Friday, Meta Platform Inc. which owns Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram said that it was blocking Russian state owned media from its social media platforms. As the state media will not be able to run advertisements, they will lose a monetary source of income as well as will be effectively blocked from billions who log on daily to apps in the Meta network.

Nathaniel Gleicher, who is the head of security policy at Facebook, posted on Twitter on Saturday that they were “prohibiting Russian state media from running ads or monetizing” on their platforms, throughout the world. The decision was made as a response to the invasion of Ukraine by Russia.

He also said that they have launched a new feature in Ukraine. This allows people to lock their profile and provides an extra layer of privacy and security so that it will add protection the people who are “on our platform.”

Earlier on Friday, Nick Clegg said that the Russian authorities had ordered Meta to stop labeling and fact checking posts that were uploaded by four Russian state-owned media companies. The vice president of global affairs said that they “refused” to do so. So, Meta services were being restricted. There is no information available about how the official restrictions will affect Meta platforms.

After the January 6 riot, social media platforms have started limiting the spread of misleading information as well as false propaganda, to a great extent. Facebook created a “Special Operations Center” so that it could fact check the information emerging from the conflict in Ukraine. They have hired experts who include native speakers in order to closely monitor the situation and to act in the shortest possible time. This has led to a tighter grip on social media by the Kremlin as it cannot control the narrative as it continues pounding Ukraine.

On Friday, Twitter had also said that they were temporarily stopping all advertisements in both Ukraine and Russia so that these ads do not detract from the elevation of “critical public safety information.”

On Saturday Twitter said that it was adding restrictions for some people in Russia but it was also “working to keep” its service “safe and accessible.”

Late Saturday night, Elon Musk CEO of SpaceX tweeted that Starlink service was available in Ukraine and that “more terminals” were “en route.” Earlier on Saturday, the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine had directly appealed to Musk to help his country as communications links were being destroyed by missiles from Russia, who has mounted an invasion against Ukraine.

Mykhailo Fedorov, who is the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine told Musk that while he tried to “colonize Mars–Russia try to occupy Ukraine.” He also said that that while Musk’s rockets landed successfully from space, the civilians in his country were being attacked by Russian rockets.

The official, who is also the minister of digital transformation, continued his post asking Musk to provide the country with Starlink stations and “to address sane Russians to stand.”

On Thursday, monitoring group NetBlocks said that they had tracked network disruptions across Ukraine and that the capital city Kyiv had also been affected with internet disruptions. As missiles continued to pound the country, several services including telecommunications services have been affected and this is where a service like Starlink can make a difference.

Starlink provides internet services to parts of the world that remain unconnected to broadband providers. Most of these areas are generally rural or desolate with large stretches of land making it impractical for broadband providers to lay cables or to provide Wifi internet connectivity.

Starlink uses a network of over 2,000 satellites in low Earth orbit to beam down the internet throughout the world. The service is accessed using a satellite dish that is placed on a person’s property. SpaceX has already put in orbit thousands of satellites as well as ground stations, to connect remote and other regions in the planet. On Friday, Spacex launched 50 new satellites in orbit.

Starlink terminals have helped to restore communications earlier this year in Tonga when there was a massive volcanic eruption and tsunami in January. Musk and SpaceX sent 50 Starlink terminals that provided free internet access to remote villages that had been cut off as a result of the natural disaster. The terminals helped restore communications in these remote areas, according to a report by Reuters.

In a stunning move, Nike decides to drop its merchandise out of many retail stores. Nike wants to go direct to consumer. The reason, better profit margins than they would sell to wholesalers. The Nike brand is also concerned about how its products are displayed and it seeks more control over its own merchandise and marketing.

They will continue to offer customers merchandise to purchase in their brick-and-mortar stores and in their online marketplace. They will also drop all  most third-party relationships with online venues as well such as retailers like Footlocker.  Footlocker, which is the largest vender for  Nike  has announced that it will take a deep dive in profits due to Nike’s decision to take the merchandise out of the stores. This will also be a big blow to other large retailers that carry the Nike brand, and it is likely profits will plummet for those businesses as well.

Other large brands like Adidas and Under Armour are also pulling back from third party resellers so they can furthermore protect their brand and increase profit margins.

(Photo:Robert Way)