If you shop on Wildberries directly through the app or pay via Yandex Pay, there’s reason to be concerned. The United Kingdom has added subsidiary banks of both companies to its sanctions list. And where sanctions appear, sooner or later cleanups begin in the App Store and Google Play. This isn’t an empty scare: the national messenger MAX was already removed from the App Store due to sanctions, so the precedent is very recent. Let’s break down what happened, who really needs to worry, and what to do right now.
The apps could very well leave the App Store in the near future
Sanctions Against WB Bank and Yandex Bank: Who Else Made the List
The UK’s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI) expanded its blacklist on June 16. It included 43 new entries, of which 27 are connected to Russia. WB Bank and Yandex Bank were hit — the subsidiary financial structures of the marketplace and the tech giant, respectively.
These entries on the sanctions list concern us the most. Image: iGuides
Also included in the list were Eurofinance Mosnarbank, Vyatich Bank, insurance companies Rosgosstrakh and Balance Insurance, as well as the A7-Agent service. The full list of restrictions can be found on the agency’s search website.
This is not the first time the British have done this. In February, they already added nine Russian banks, including Pochta Bank, Tochka Bank, and Ak Bars Bank. There’s no single rule here, and Apple sometimes acts inconsistently: prohibited apps have been found in the App Store even after strict restrictions were imposed.
Why Wildberries and Yandex Pay Could Disappear from the App Store
It all comes down to how the software is structured at these companies.
WB Bank is built into Wildberries itself
Wildberries doesn’t have a separate banking app. All WB Bank financial services are embedded in the main shopping app. This means the wallet, installment plans, and payments all live inside the same app you use to order socks and chargers. What’s at risk of removal isn’t a niche banking client, but the marketplace’s main app entirely.
Yandex has a different situation. The company’s financial services are concentrated in a separate Yandex Pay app. If sanctions force Apple and Google to block access to it, the removal would affect specifically that app, not the entire ecosystem. Maps, Taxi, and Music should theoretically remain in place.
What Apple Usually Does with Sanctioned Apps
This is where you need a cool head, because it’s too early to panic. First of all, both WB Bank and Yandex Bank have already responded. Their press services stated that sanctions won’t affect operations, customers can carry out all transactions as usual, and the restrictions don’t apply to the parent companies. The banks themselves aren’t announcing any mass exodus from the stores.
Second, it’s important to understand the difference in the source of sanctions. All the high-profile removals of Russian apps in 2022 and 2024 were triggered by American sanctions from OFAC. It was after those that Sberbank Online, VTB apps, Alfa-Bank, and T-Bank disappeared from the stores. Apple and Google primarily look at US sanctions since that’s their home jurisdiction.
British restrictions from OFSI work differently and far from always lead to store cleanups. There’s no direct connection of “got on the British list, so tomorrow you’re out of the App Store.” But the risk still exists, and the messenger story shows how it ends: after removal, getting the app back on iPhone won’t be possible.
How to Keep Wildberries and Yandex Pay on Your iPhone
Even if removal isn’t guaranteed, spending a couple of minutes on precautions is worth it.
- Update the Wildberries and Yandex Pay apps to the latest version while they’re still available. If the app is eventually removed from the store, you’ll have a fresh working build on hand rather than an outdated version that will stop working sooner.
- Don’t delete installed apps — this is the key point for iPhone owners. After removal from the App Store, getting the app back is nearly impossible, and restoring from a backup doesn’t always work. On Android it’s a bit easier — you can download an APK file and install it manually.
Make sure to update your apps
And one more step that people often forget about. iOS has a feature called “Offload Unused Apps” that automatically deletes rarely opened apps, leaving only their data on the phone. If such an app has disappeared from the App Store by that point, reinstalling it won’t be possible. So it’s worth disabling this feature in advance:
It’s better to keep this feature disabled in Russia
- Open “Settings” on your iPhone.
- Scroll down and go to the App Store section.
- Find the “Offload Unused Apps” option.
- Toggle the switch to the off position.
After this, the system will stop touching your apps, and Wildberries along with Yandex Pay will stay in place even if you haven’t used them in a while. Remember backup ways to access services. If the Wildberries app does get removed, you can place orders through the mobile version of the website in your browser. It’s less convenient, but the basic marketplace features are available there.
The bottom line: there’s no reason to panic yet — the banks are operating normally, and British sanctions less frequently lead to App Store removals than American ones. But updating your apps and not deleting them from your device certainly won’t hurt.
