Sputnik (news agency)

Sputnik is a Russian international news agency and radio brand launched on November 10, 2014 by the state-owned Rossiya Segodnya, tracing its lineage to Radio Moscow, the Soviet Union's international broadcaster founded in 1929. Headquartered in Moscow with regional bureaus including Washington D.C., Cairo, Beijing, Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Montevideo and Rio de Janeiro, it produces news content in multiple languages alongside more than 800 hours of radio programming daily, describing its focus as global politics and economics for international audiences. Academics and journalists have widely characterized Sputnik as a Russian propaganda outlet; following Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine the European Union banned Sputnik alongside RT, and major platforms including Facebook, YouTube, Microsoft and Apple removed its content and applications, leaving it operating roughly sixteen language services worldwide outside Europe.