Apple has started blocking transactions on Russian accounts due to sanctions

Apple is blocking purchases and subscriptions for accounts of people from Russia whose data matches information about sanctioned individuals. This was announced on February 12 by the portal IPhones.ru .

The company offers users to go through the identity verification procedure by sending them to the document download page. An account is blocked due to a data match, which is usually the result of an automatic check on the sanctions lists.

The problem may arise if the user's first and last name match those listed in the authorized persons list. This is also possible due to differences in transliteration or a partial match of the data in the account.

As the portal noted, any changes to the account may lead to new checks, which will delay the unblocking process.

They started overtaking: scammers began to attack iPhone owners more often than Android users

This is attributed to the careless behavior of the victims themselves.

On November 30, 2025, the Department for Combating the Illegal use of information and Communication Technologies (UBK) of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation reported that intruders in Russia were luring citizens' money by blocking Apple gadgets under the pretext of installing gaming applications. After the user enters the Apple ID data on their device, the attackers activate the "Find iPhone" function and switch the smartphone to "Lost" mode, completely blocking it.

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