Social media site Twitter has, effective immediately, banned RT and Sputnik from buying advertising amid fears they attempted to interfere with the 2016 US election. US authorities say both of the Russian media outlets act as “a platform for Kremlin messaging”.

Twitter will donate an estimated $1.9 million made from the outlets into research on its use in “civic engagement and elections”.

Twitter said the decision “was based on the retrospective work we’ve been doing around the 2016 US election and the US intelligence community’s conclusion that both RT and Sputnik attempted to interfere with the election on behalf of the Russian government”.

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