Niantic Suspends Operations in Russia & Belarus

Niantic Labs has joined the game companies that impose sanctions on Russia and Belarus.

In a tweet posted on Thursday, March 10 by the official Twitter account of Niantic Labs, the company announced that it has joined other companies and has ceased all operations in Russia and Belarus. This includes Pokemon GO, Ingress, and other games operated by Niantic. The decision took effect immediately and the company’s games were removed from digital markets in these countries.

As noted above, Niantic is not the first company to take a stand by completely shutting down service over Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine. Other names include Electronic Arts (EA), Nintendo, Rockstar Games, and Ubisoft, which have taken action to stop, pause sales and/or reach out to employees affected by violence.

However, as with other announcements, some users did not agree with this move, which they saw as an unfair punishment of Russian citizens who had nothing to do with the actions taken by the government. Still, many users praised Niantic for its actions.

If this trend continues, Niantic won’t be the last to add its name to the list.