Apple recently made a change to its own map service, Maps, at the urging of the Russian government. The company has now commented on the matter.
Apple has marked the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea as part of Russia in the Russian version of Maps - Crimea will also be listed as Russian in the weather application from now on. The company made this change at the government's insistence and emphasized that this only applies to Russia and not to other countries. This brought the company a lot of criticism - including from Ukraine. Now Apple has spoken out and defended the decision. The statement says:
We want to clarify for our customers around the world that we have not made any changes to Apple Maps regarding Crimea outside of Russia, where a new law has come into effect requiring us to update the map within Russia.
Apple
Apple is facing a number of problems in this case. When Russia annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea in 2014 despite international protests, the country was subjected to sanctions by the West. Companies that accommodate Russia on this issue are often themselves attacked and punished by the EU or the USA. (Photo by hadrian / Bigstockphoto)
We review international law, as well as relevant U.S. and other national laws, before making decisions about labeling on our maps and make changes when required by law. We're taking a closer look at how we handle disputed borders in our services so we may make changes in the future. We want to make sure our customers can use Maps and other Apple services anywhere in the world.
Apple
