YouTube removes link to Russian opposition initiative: Alexei Navalny is Russia’s opposition leader. YouTube has censored links to his SmartVote initiative, a project designed to consolidate the votes of those who oppose Russia’s ruling party, United Russia. The platform removed a link to the initiative from a video uploaded by Sota Vision, a Russian news YouTube channel. "On Thursday, Russia’s news outlet Sota Vision reported that YouTube had removed a link to the SmartVote initiative from one of its videos that was streamed in August 2019 during anti-government protests," ReclaimTheNet reported. YouTube claimed the video violated its "spam, deceptive practices, and scam policies.” ReclaimTheNet also reported that similar links had been removed by YouTube on videos uploaded by Novaya Gazeta, and opposition politician Ilya Yashin. When the SmartVote intititive launched in 2018 Russia's media regulator, Roskomnadzor, quickly blacklisted the sites, according to ReclaimTheNet, claiming the sites violated Russia's privacy laws. Sota Vision believes the removal of the SmartVote links from its videos were the result of a complaint brought forth by Roskomnadzor, according to ReclaimTheNet.