The sub-operators Yandex Go and Yango operate in around 20 countries around the world. Among them are Norway, Finland, Israel and Belarus.
Journalists in the Russian Meduza are said to have gained access to communications between employees of the taxi service and the board.
Screenshot from Yango’s Norwegian website.
It has emerged, they write, that information about both Russian and foreign users of Yandex Go and Yango is stored in Russia.
At the same time, management must have asked its employees not to tell their customers about this.
According to a decision by the Prime Minister of Russia, Mikhail Misjustin, the FSB will have access to this data around the clock from 1 September.
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Misjustin has signed the request for data concerning Yandex’s customers.
Photo: Dmitry Astakhov / AP
In the privacy statement on Yango’s Norwegian-language website, dated 19 October 2020, it states that personal data can be used by:
The company Yandex, a company established under Russian law with its head office registered at a special address in Russia (where Yandex is also registered),
or companies affiliated with Yandex for “certain services or in certain jurisdictions”
Yandex denied on Tuesday evening that the information provided by Meduza is correct, and says that data about journeys is only collected by “law enforcement agencies in the country where the journey took place”.
What does Yango mean by personal data?
Expand/minimize fact box
All information you provide when creating a user account, such as: name telephone number address Electronic data, such as Information linked to online activity when you use the services, such as: your search history e-mail contacts their e-mail addresses likes and preferences
Accurate city information, i.e. where you have stayed
Information you have provided to other companies that are partners of Yandex
(Source: Yango.com/no)
The Norwegian Data Protection Authority intervened
The Norwegian Data Protection Authority has already intervened in the case.
– The Danish Data Protection Authority learns that the taxi service Yango transfers personal information about Norwegian citizens to Russia, the Danish Data Protection Authority writes in a press release.
– A new Russian law will apparently give Russian authorities unlimited access to this data. We have therefore notified Yango of an urgent decision.
The Danish Data Protection Authority has given Yango until 14 August to comment on the case, and promises to make a decision before the new Russian law comes into force.
The Finnish ombudsman for data protection says on Tuesday that they have issued an order to Yandex LLC and Ridetech International BV as a result of the disclosure.
Yandex collects information about its customers through the app used to book travel, writes Meduza.
Photo: Ali Zare / NTB
In it, they ask the company to stop sending customers’ personal information to data centers in Russia that have been collected through Yango.
They further write that the information is first sent to the Dutch Ridetech for processing, and that data supervision in Finland, Norway cooperates closely with the Netherlands.
The Finnish order lasts until 30 November.
I think it is especially dangerous for Russians
In the first half of 2019, Yandex received more than 15,000 requests from the authorities in Russia to disclose user data.
The taxi company must have agreed to 84 percent of these, writes the newspaper.
Grigorij Bakunov, former technology director of the taxi company, is said to have told Meduza that the transfer of data to the FSB poses a particular risk to Russians in former Soviet countries.
Here, a Yandex taxi drives in central Moscow.
Photo: ALEXANDER NEMENOV / AFP
– The data collection contains information about taxis in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Georgia and other places that the Russians went to after the war started.
– This is a threat, I would say, which is more significant than access to data about Finland, Norway and Algeria.
Two anonymous Yandex employees have confirmed to Meduza that the information is sent to the Moscow, Ryazan and Vladimir regions.
Yandex itself wins for newspaper:
– Russian law does not apply to Yango’s international operations and Yango users, as they travel and use the app outside of Russia. This will not change after 1 September.
NRK has contacted Yango Norga and Yandex’s Russia office for a comment on the information, but has not yet received a reply.
2023-08-08 20:53:17
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