Will Russia's New Data Protection Law Impact SEOs and SMBs Outside of Russia?
-
We've all seen the news recently that Google will be closing its engineering offices in Russia due to new data protection laws coming into place in January 2015. The same law has also led to Adobe pulling out of Russia earlier in the year.
I was wondering how you think this will impact SEOers and small/medium businesses that market _to _Russia, but are based outside of the country? Personal data has been defined in the new legislation as:
- Personal data means any information directly or indirectly related to any identified or potentially identifiable person. It includes, among other things, first name and family name, date and place of birth, address, information about family status, education, profession, income
For those businesses which don't process personal data (affiliates etc), will there be any foreseeable impact?
On the flipside, are there any benefits here for affiliate businesses inside of Russia? I'm using affiliates as an example to get the ball rolling, but I'm sure there's numerous more. Personally, I'd be interested to hear if you think this may impact corporate websites which don't process personal data, but operate outside of Russia.
-
That's really interesting - I hadn't thought of the impact to the Ukraine, but that definitely makes sense.
I think as you've highlighted, Google and Europe more generally is a tricky issue at the moment, what with the recent issues in Spain and the not-very-helpful suggestion that Google should 'break up'. In the UK, the chancellor has just announced a 'Google Tax' which will no doubt go down as well as the legislative changes in Spain.
This article has a kind of doomsday scenario where Google pulls out of Europe, but I can't really foresee that happening. What do you reckon? It does worry me the way Google and Europe are colliding so much at the moment.
-
this is going to be a really bad thing for businesses as well as individuals in Russia.
Yes I'm sure you could exploit the system for a short period however I believe the idea of the system is to close off Russia from the rest of the world there is very high chance of Vladimir Putin allowing businesses that benefit himself and his friends to use the Internet but aside from that my opinion is in 10 years from now Russia will have its own web and it will not be a pretty picture for those outside of Russia or those inside.
In fact I don't mean to go on but I've read quite a bit about this and I think that it is one of the most unfortunate things that will happen to the population in my lifetime. Putin is trying to get American European whoever to build data centers to spy on his own people I think what is going to occur and this is only based on my opinion is what it would be like to have North Korea if it had data centers and the Internet.
I know Vladimir Putin called Yadex a American spy tool I don't think that he is getting any comfort from the information he's obtained from Edward Snowden.
I believe it will have a enormous impact on Russia the Ukraine and even parts of Europe. I am a German and the sanctions are not enough Putin was a KGB guy I don't think he is going to lead Russia into enlightenment unfortunately I feel that he will use technology to spy on his own people in order to Keep tabs on what he may consider any threats to his interest for him keeping power in Russia.
I look at this is one of the most bleak things in the world and it is truly sad. Yes I believe there will be an open market for black hat tactics doing whatever you want pretty much I don't recommend getting involved in it however the choices yours.
I'm really glad that you brought this up is something that easily spoken about more often.
Sincerely,
Thomas
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Bing SEO
Hi I am seeing a large drop in our traffic from Bing - this is usually a good traffic source for us. The drop seems to be at the same time Google had the slow roll out of Panda 4.2 - would this have anything to do with it? Becky
Algorithm Updates | | BeckyKey0 -
Google's Mobile Update: What We Know So Far (Updated 3/25)
We're getting a lot of questions about the upcoming Google mobile algorithm update, and so I wanted to start a discussion that covers what we know at this point (or, at least, what we think we know). If you have information that contradicts this or expands on it, please feel free to share it in the comments. This is a developing situation. 1. What is the mobile update? On February 26th, Google announced that they would start factoring in mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. The official announcement is here. Of note, "This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results." 2. When will the update happen? In an unprecedented move, Google announced that the algorithm update will begin on April 21st. Keep in mind that the roll-out could take days or weeks. 3. Will this affect my desktop rankings? As best we know - no. Mobile-friendliness will only impact mobile rankings. This is important, because it suggests that desktop and mobile rankings, which are currently similar, will diverge. In other words, even though desktop and mobile SERPs look very different, if a site is #1 on desktop, it's currently likely to be #1 on mobile. After April 21st, this may no longer be the case. 4. Is this a boost or a demotion? This isn't clear, but practically it doesn't matter that much and the difference can be very difficult to measure. If everyone gets moved to the front of the line except you, you're still at the back of the line. Google has implied that this isn't a Capital-P Penalty in the sense we usually mean it. Most likely, the mobile update is coded as a ranking boost. 5. Is this a domain- or page-based update? At SMX West, Google's Gary Ilyes clarified that the update would operate on the page level. Any mobile-friendly page can benefit from the update, and an entire site won't be demoted simply because a few pages aren't mobile friendly. 6. Is mobile-friendly on a scale or is it all-or-none? For now, Google seems to be suggesting that a page is either mobile-friendly or not. Either you make the cut or you don't. Over time, this may evolve, but expect the April 21st launch to be all-or-none. 7. How can I tell if my site/page is mobile-friendly? Google has provided a mobile-friendly testing tool, and pages that are mobile-friendly should currently show the "Mobile-friendly" label on mobile searches (this does not appear on desktop searches). Some SEOs are saying that different tools/tests are showing different results, and it appears that the mobile-friendly designation has a number of moving parts. 8. How often will mobile data refresh? Gary also suggested (and my apologies for potentially confusing people on Twitter) that this data will be updated in real-time. Hopefully, that means we won't have to worry about Penguin-style updates that take months to happen. If a page or site becomes mobile-friendly, it should benefit fairly quickly. We're actively working to re-engineer the MozCast Project for mobile rankings and have begun collecting data. We will publish that data as soon as possible after April 21st (assuming it;s useful and that Google sticks to this date). We're also tracking the presence of the "Mobile-friendly" tag. Currently (as of 3/25), across 10,000 page-1 mobile results, about 63% of URLs are labeled as "Mobile-friendly". This is a surprisingly large number (to me, at least) - we'll see how it changes over time.
Algorithm Updates | | Dr-Pete15 -
New feature in seo results with icon?
I have never seen it before in the search: an icon in the title. Do you guys know how to get this icon in the title? See here: http://snag.gy/e7BiI.jpg e7BiI.jpg
Algorithm Updates | | Emilija1 -
Will Parked Domain hurt My SEO as Duplicate Content?
Hello, I have one website (Migration Lawyers) and I have an extra 8 domains Parked so they are basically cloning the content of the site. so if the main site is: migrationlawyers.co.za and I have an addon domain migration-lawyers.com is that good or bad? is there a proper way to redirect the sites, will redirecting (301) subdomains be more effective? Thanks for your Input 🙂 0i8VXqr.png
Algorithm Updates | | thealika0 -
Vanity URL's and http codes
We have a vanity URL that as recommended is using 301 http code, however it has been discovered the destination URL needs to be updated which creates a problem since most browsers and search engines cache 301 redirects. Is there a good way to figure out when a vanity should be a 301 vs 302/307? If all vanity URL's should use 301, what is the proper way of updating the destination URL? Is it a good rule of thumb that if the vanity URL is only going to be temporary and down the road could have a new destination URL to use 302, and all others 301? Cheers,
Algorithm Updates | | Shawn_Huber0 -
Why some results in SERP have a www. and some don't
Hello all, If this is posted twice, I didn't mean for it to be - but it looks like last time I tried to post this question it didn't post. This is my question: How come some results on Google's SERP page are shown with a "www" and some are not? Does this effect SEO at all? I am including a screen shot so you can see what I mean. The Geary Interactive result has a "www" in front of while ingenexdigital doesn't. R6GLL.png
Algorithm Updates | | digitalops0 -
Effect of new Google SSL policy on our Analytics - AACK!
So I went to look at our keyword reports in GA today and our most popular keyword was "(not provided)". It now accounts for 10% of our referred visits. Unfortunately, it also has a 125% avg order value compared to the rest of our site. This is a really annoying policy that Google has implemented and will clearly have an effect on our ability to effectively market our site.
Algorithm Updates | | IanTheScot0 -
Re-directing old domains to New Domains
I previously had a domain with good ranking, but had to redirect this to a new domain for branding purposing and has only been around for 1 year instead 10 years like the previous. Does the weight of the entire pagerank from the old domain get transferred to the new domain? How does Google handle this? The old domain had a good keyword in the name, which help rank that keyword...does that keyword also get transferred to the new domain with Google?
Algorithm Updates | | SEOCM0