diff --git a/iib/web/models.py b/iib/web/models.py
index c87414e12..50e6d28da 100644
--- a/iib/web/models.py
+++ b/iib/web/models.py
@@ -10,7 +10,6 @@
 from flask import current_app, url_for
 from flask_login import UserMixin, current_user
 from flask_sqlalchemy.model import DefaultMeta
-import ruamel.yaml
 import sqlalchemy
 from sqlalchemy.ext.declarative import declared_attr
 from sqlalchemy.orm import joinedload, load_only, Mapped, validates
@@ -46,17 +45,6 @@
     FbcOperationRequestResponse,
 )
 
-yaml = ruamel.yaml.YAML()
-# IMPORTANT: ruamel will introduce a line break if the yaml line is longer than yaml.width.
-# Unfortunately, this causes issues for JSON values nested within a YAML file, e.g.
-# metadata.annotations."alm-examples" in a CSV file.
-# The default value is 80. Set it to a more forgiving higher number to avoid issues
-yaml.width = 200
-# ruamel will also cause issues when normalizing a YAML object that contains
-# a nested JSON object when it does not preserve quotes. Thus, it produces
-# invalid YAML. Let's prevent this from happening at all.
-yaml.preserve_quotes = True
-
 
 class BaseEnum(Enum):
     """A base class for IIB enums."""
@@ -2336,9 +2324,9 @@ def from_json(  # type: ignore[override] # noqa: F821
         if not _deprecation_schema or not isinstance(_deprecation_schema, str):
             raise ValidationError('"deprecation_schema" should be a non-empty string')
         try:
-            yaml.load(_deprecation_schema)
-        except ruamel.yaml.YAMLError:
-            raise ValidationError('"deprecation_schema" string should be valid YAML')
+            json.loads(_deprecation_schema)
+        except ValueError:
+            raise ValidationError('"deprecation_schema" string should be valid JSON')
 
         # cast to more wider type, see _from_json method
         cls._from_json(
diff --git a/tests/test_web/test_api_v1.py b/tests/test_web/test_api_v1.py
index 6347e7b14..da7b01cd1 100644
--- a/tests/test_web/test_api_v1.py
+++ b/tests/test_web/test_api_v1.py
@@ -2875,9 +2875,9 @@ def test_fbc_operations(
                 'from_index': 'pull:spec',
                 'binary_image': 'binary:image',
                 'operator_package': 'my-package',
-                'deprecation_schema': '{invalid_yaml',
+                'deprecation_schema': '{{{invalid_json',
             },
-            '"deprecation_schema" string should be valid YAML',
+            '"deprecation_schema" string should be valid JSON',
         ),
     ),
 )