Apple and Google close a loophole that allowed Russians to infiltrate the electronic payments system

Apple has closed a loophole that allowed some Russians to continue using its mobile payment service despite ongoing economic sanctions against Russia.

The US company has informed Russia's largest credit company, NSPK, that it will not support Russia's domestic Mir payments system through Apple Pay, according to a report published Reuters Agency .

"Starting March 24, users cannot add new Mir cards to the service. Apple will also stop all operations for pre-added cards over the next few days," the National Card Payment System said.

Google took similar action last week, according to a separate report from The Wall Street Journal , in which the company halted a program that allowed Russians to link their Mir cards to Google Pay.

"We have temporarily suspended payments related services in Russia as a result of disrupting payment services outside our control," a Google spokesperson said.

A report by The Verge stated that the Russian Central Bank set up MIR after the United States and other countries imposed sanctions on Russia in response to its 2014 annexation of Crimea.

According to statistics published by the Russian Central Bank, Mir cards were used in more than 25% of transactions made within Russia using the cards.