Google Closing Engineering Office In Russia 157
An anonymous reader writes: The Wall Street Journal reports (paywalled) that Google is closing its engineering office in Russia. This follows ever-increasing crackdowns from the Russian government over internet freedoms, and intrusive data-handling requirements on internet companies. "[A] new law that takes effect next year requires information on Russian citizens to be stored in data centers in Russia. The law will also penalize Web firms for infringing on personal data rules in the country. Another law passed earlier this year requires bloggers with 3,000 or more daily readers to register with the government and provide their home address. The ruling prevents these bloggers from using foul language and forbids them from spreading false information."
Re: False information? (Score:1)
You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives...You don't want the truth. Becau
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Son, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be guarded by men with guns.
I remember breaking into laughter several times when watching Nicholson and Moore praise the men on the walls without mentioning that those walls are in someone else's country. Oh, the glory of being an occupying power maintaining an empire!
50 engineers (Score:5, Interesting)
According to an article at ZDNet, the office Google is closing has 50 engineers, and they've been offered positions in offices outside of Russia. Adobe already closed offices in Russia earlier this year, for likely the same reason.
http://www.zdnet.com/article/g... [zdnet.com]
Re:50 engineers (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, who do they think they are? America?
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You are aware, of course, that the US does a significant amount of international trade... Right? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_trade
Largest countries by international trade:
1 - China (largest overall, 43% of GDP)
2 - USA (second largest overall, 23% of GDP)
3 - Germany (71% of GDP)
4 - Japan (31.6% of GDP)
5 - Netherlands (147% of GDP)
No one in the US is saying "We don't need the world!". We import nearly 20% of our food, for God's sake!
(http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/international-markets-trade
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You are aware, of course, that the US does a significant amount of international trade... Right? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I... [wikipedia.org]
Largest countries by international trade:
1 - China (largest overall, 43% of GDP)
2 - USA (second largest overall, 23% of GDP)
3 - Germany (71% of GDP)
4 - Japan (31.6% of GDP)
5 - Netherlands (147% of GDP)
No one in the US is saying "We don't need the world!". We import nearly 20% of our food, for God's sake!
(http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/international-markets-trade/us-agricultural-trade/import-share-of-consumption.aspx)
How can Netherlands get more than 100% of its GDP from trade? You may as well say that income from trade accounts for 1.47x its GDP which makes it clear how absurd the statement is.
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How can Netherlands get more than 100% of its GDP from trade? You may as well say that income from trade accounts for 1.47x its GDP which makes it clear how absurd the statement is.
Or you could look at the link and then look up nomimal GDP vs PPP GDP and you'll have your answer.
Re:50 engineers (Score:4, Informative)
GDP = Consumption + Governmentspending + eXport - iMport
Exports and imports can both be many multiples of your GDP as long as they cancel themselves out. This is very common in small, open economies that are heavily reliant on trade.
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GDP = Consumption + Governmentspending + eXport - iMport
Exports and imports can both be many multiples of your GDP as long as they cancel themselves out. This is very common in small, open economies that are heavily reliant on trade.
Thank you!
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How can Netherlands get more than 100% of its GDP from trade?
Wild guess: Netherlands' ports are a major entry to the EU market. Every good that comes in by the ports then goes to another country is accounted as Netherlands trade.
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Stop using that term (Score:1)
The term is oppression, not "crackdown". The term "crackdown" implies something illegal or immoral going on in the first place -- and the situation here (freedom of association) is nothing like that. The situation here (as in most other parts of the world) is that government has decided to oppress your natural human right to free association. Unless you are a member of the oppressive force -- which logically you can't be if you are also the subject of that oppression -- you are being oppressed, not "cracked
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I can't blame them. If you have 50 engineers in Russia with access to the network then you have a set of employees that can be leveraged to give access and data to the FSB. It's just too much risk for the employees, the company and the customers.
Obligatory Russian reversal (Score:2)
In America, you bloggers are disputin' registering.
In Russia, dis Putin is registering you bloggers!
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"[A] new law that takes effect next year requires information on Russian citizens to be stored in data centers in Russia.
In Soviet Russia, Office is Engineering you.
Growing Isolation (Score:1, Interesting)
I find this rather disturbing in light of Russia's Growing Isolation [thediplomat.com]. I'm left to wonder if Russia is 'just being Russia' or if these laws are being passed with the intent of gently nudging companies like Google and Adobe out of the country. Russia's recent actions in Ukraine have left me with a very Hitleresk taste.
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... why not stalinesque? you know putin's actual role model?
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Because Stalin fought the far right, whereas Putin is in bed with the far right:
http://uk.businessinsider.com/... [businessinsider.com]
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Luckily, Kaspersky is based in Moscow, so that's one high-tech business that's likely to continue operating in Russia, regardless of Russian isolation.
I'm sure Putin appreciates having a firm that is dedicated to protecting the world's computers form malware located right handy there in the Russian capital. I recently switched from Kaspersky to another product when a Russian friend of mine pointed out the obvious fact that an anti-malware product that's popular worldwide could be quite a dangerous thing in
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And considering that McAfee and Symantec have been named in regards to the NSA scandal, Kaspersky seems to be an even better option. All USA products and services are tainted.
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I feel what you say is entirely true, and yet am compelled to add ...
NSA (mass surveillance proven), CIA (torture, kidnapping, coups against democratic countries, assasinations, propaganda, funding of insurgents/terrorists/narco terrorists proven), America being instrumental in creating Al Qaeda, ISIS, etc (blowback) and ... Microsoft, Google, Apple, all the American tech companies who have a cosy relationship with their government.
At a certain point the difference between Russia under Putin and America und
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I figured such points would be made. Anyway, I don't see any advantage in using a security product from a country that is increasingly at odds with my own. Russian folks (that is, the ones who still live there, unlike my friend) may feel the same way about the American companies.
My Russian friend makes the point that everybody thinks they're the good guy, and that everybody else is the bad guy. So in reality, maybe everybody is the bad guy. Oh, except that my friend has many positive things to say about
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Again, I find myself agreeing with you largely, and would merely add that the President is mostly a figurehead (albeit one with *some* clout) and there are a body of people behind the scenes, who are not elected that run the show. And that includes corporate and wealthy power outside but with access. The US isn't a dictatorship, but the people who control what happens are just as unconcerned with the little people as any dictator.
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This is cute :) It's like five-year-old thinks that he's "gangsta".
Such comparison between USA and Russia can only be made if you are really ignorant about what goes on in Russia.
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What Russian actions in Ukraine?
-The relief convoys sent to aid the molested masses left in the wake of the actual self-described Nazi thugs which seized the elected government and drove it into the ground?
Or their make-believe invasion/s which Washington insists took place, but of which there is zero evidence? (If Russia decided to invade, Ukraine would be under Russian rule. Seems simple enough. Since that is not the case, there was no invasion.)
Careful what you read; the air is thick, thick, th
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You're trying to sound like the enlightened, reasonable one while sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting "LA LA LA LA LA NOT LISTENING!" You should not be surprised when some people respond with the intellectual gravity it deserves.
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Yeah, two sides of the same coin, eh? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new... [telegraph.co.uk]
Our media is allowed to criticize the government.
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Funny, I've got all that information from the New York Times.
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"self-described Nazi thugs which seized the elected government and drove it into the ground"
Anybody who was watching it unfold knows that is simply not true. The government abandoned their posts, and then your man Yanukovych fled like a pussy. It doesn't matter what Washington said, we were all watching on live video. The fact that the CIA also has plots and goals is largely irrelevant.
But I actually agree that Crimea belongs to Russia (unless you want to discuss giving it back to Turkey). While Ukraine and
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It kind of simply IS true, though.
Ukraine is a complete disaster. They have worse infrastructure at the moment than freaking Palestine, they're in debt up to their eyeballs and there are house-to-house murders o
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Re:Growing Isolation (Score:5, Insightful)
I think people are all too quick to credit every action Putin takes as being part of some grant overarching plan. Does one think his grand overarching plan included the Ruble falling 40% and the economy solidly on path to contraction after a bunch of failed poorly thought-out attempts to bolster them while turning Ukraine from a militarily-incompetent country with a largely very pro-Russian population into a Russia-hating country full of veterans and causing its neighbors to start clamouring for (and in some cases, getting) NATO bases that NATO had previously been reluctant to do?
Putin's not some brilliant chessmaster pulling all the strings, but nor is he some sort of bumbling fool. He's just a person. He's made some moves in the past that have turned out to be excellent strategically. He's also made a number of blunders. But he's now committed to this path, so he has to walk it wherever it takes him. Given his style, he'll probably keep doubling down.
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Given his style, he'll probably keep doubling down.
Let's hope so. That's a sure formula for winning in Vegas.
Re:Growing Isolation (Score:4, Interesting)
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We are quite lucky that Russia didn't do what they should have done with the oil money. Create a massive sovereign wealth fund. Norway has the largest that's heading towards a trillion dollars. China is over a Trillion if you combine funds controlled by various entities. Russia on the the other hand has a couple very modest funds (under $100bn).
Why are we lucky? Because Russia has been looking for a way to economically hurt the United States for a very long time. When the financial market crashed in 2
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That's why the price of oil has tumbled. It's collusion to drive Russia further into chaos.
That's why the price of oil has tumbled. It's collusion to drive Russia further into chaos.
It's not collusion; it's strategic economic sanction using market manipulation.
Non-OPEC oil-producing nations have increased their oil production thereby glutting the market. Once the oil market tumbled, Russia's bid to annex Ukraine to secure oil supply not only became moot. It also became a liability.
Now that the fallen Russian economy is forecast to fall even further, Putin's political machine is trying to counte
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looks fairly similar to the Chinese [...] subpoena the results, rather than tap the endpoints, so having Russians using American services hosted in places where getting the good stuff is either impossible or at least impossible to do silently isn't desirable
I'm waiting for the US law that "no American citizen may interact with a site in a data-embargoed country," meaning one which doesn't eagerly comply with all US subpoenas and terrorism-letters. Maybe then Google will announce closing its US engineering offices.
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As best I can see, the treatment of foreign web companies is a somewhat less polished version of the Chinese one(and, given how closely tied the economy and state budget are to oil prices, probably something they'd be wise to turn into a more polished version of the Chinese model sooner rather than later).
In mil
Not just Russia.. its global internet isolation. (Score:2)
Resources have a way of not having boundaries, radio waves, land, water... and internet.
We have already put man made boundaries on other resources, so why not internet. It is just inevitable. The sad bit is that internet is not like land or water, there is abundance of it, unfortunately we just don't know how to handle abundance.
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Look at China and parts of Europe. Internet isolationism is predictable along with personal encryption, false identities, and the increased reliance on old, known technologies like landlines, faxes, credit card impression machines, and snail mail.
The Internet is not performing up to expectations and people are considering options.
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If you ever watch CNN (TV) you will see continuous false information and it is managed by The Whitehouse personally.
You really telling me that programs like Fareed Zakaria's GPS are 'false information managed by the White House?'
Have you even watched a few episodes?
Saying things like this completely blow your credibility.
Re:A cold war is brewing... (Score:4, Informative)
What about the states? (Score:3, Interesting)
There are fundamental abuses of rights here too. Is google going to shut down here as well? Google regularly participates in illegal spying programs.
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The law is whatever the tyrant wants it to be. That doesn't make it right.
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Essentially, yes. Except that here, the government and corporations do each others' dirty work to get around the law and get what they want at public expense.
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They kill everyone. It just doesn't make the news if the person's white.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: so let me get this straight... (Score:1)
Does not matter. He/she/it killed a lot of people by the action of handing over secret documents, with people's names and the names of their families.
This is not whistleblowing. This is treason, pure and simple, with a pile of people killed directly due to his actions. Had this selling of secrets happened in China or Russia, Manning would long since have been disposed of.
I will never get this hero worship of the Triad of Treason. These people have done the world great harm and caused much worse entitie
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Who got killed due to Manning? I'm really suspicious of "killed a lot of people".
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This is not whistleblowing. This is treason, pure and simple
People use that word, not because of what it means, but because of how something makes them feel. The word "treason" actually has a specific meaning. you can't bandy it around because you don't like something, or even because an act happened to aid the enemy. The perpetrator's intent is critical -- and it's not enough for that intent to be wildly misguided. If the perpetrator's intent was to support and defend the Constitution, or to prevent war crimes, it makes no difference whether you think that intent
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I'd guess this has nothing to do with liberties or morals. Where (apart from the summary and TFA's opinionated texts) did you read that? "Google could not be immediately reached for comment." it says, at least outside of the paywall.
The Russian law changed. If Google stores personal data of Russians, it must now be done in Russia.
Therefore, Google has two options. Open a datacenter to store this data in Russia, or close their Russian subsidiary, which would be breaking this new law.
Google chose the latter,
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Well, there's a substantial practical difference between closing a branch office of 50 employees and shutting down your corporate HQ and main data center.
But, more importantly, the consequences of calling out the US government for bad behaviour is tame compared to how Putin handles corporate dissent.
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Google is leaving russia due to data security and intrusive legislation that harms the internet, but sees no problem maintaining an office in the United States, where the government has created secret courts to warrantlessly wiretap what ostensibly amounts to the entire country. Google is just fine with a corporate office in a country that uses state sponsored terrorism and maintains a torture prison. Its Fine with opening offices in a country that jailed Chelsea Manning for whistleblowing or rather spreading "false information" and subsequently ensured 2 years of her forcible detention under suicide watch stripped nude and prevented from sleeping. Google has no problem with a country that runs secret torture prisons and "targeted killings." but whenever Russia passes legislation to force Internet sites that store the personal data of Russian citizens to do so inside the country, it closes shop because it doesnt want to maintain a russian datacenter? or rather is it because in America its not a requirement thanks to a rendition network that just takes people and servers regardless of the country.
For every thing Russia does you can pull up something from the US that sounds similarly bad unless you go into some nuanced detail.
But there's one big difference. In the US you have the luxury of this stuff being debated in government, in the media, on talk radio, on the Internet, and in person. Active censorship or oppression of these discussions is extremely rare.
Do you think you could do the same in Russia?
I'm not saying the US is great, it's done, and continues to do, some really awful things. But the w
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So that's the standard now? "At least we're not as bad as Russia?"
No, it's "the US doing bad things doesn't provide license for other countries to do horrible things (or vice versa)"
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Oh bullshit.
The US government obviously secretly spies on citizens just like Russia and most other countries. Yeah, it's annoying but you are naive if you think it's not ubiquitous.
But the US does not imprison journalists and artists for things like speaking badly of the government or singing an "offensive" song in a church.
Google was worried their employees in Russia would be held criminally accountable for draconian spying and censorship laws, and so they decided it wasn't worth risking. They aren't wor
'reasonable' move. (Score:1)
So Google closes engeneering office on grounds that Russian government makes it more difficult for NSA to snoop on its citizens?
Or maybe Google closes engeneering office on grounds that Russian government doesn't want its country to be affected when USA prezident doesn't feel like allowing any other country in the world to have its own foreign policy?
Yeah, seems like a 'reasonable' move.
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Bloggers (Score:2, Insightful)
So if the russian government doesn't like a blogger, all it has to do is hit the blog 3000 times within a day to force him to register, give his name and address, and have him under control.
Captcha: unfair
First part seems good (Score:4, Informative)
The second part is much worse and a continuation of russian policy to keep journalists and other people who have unpleasant things to say silent.
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It seems though that it will in this case only give the government more control over your data.
I think this is the deeper reasoning behind most such moves all over the world. We've seen a lot of motion in this direction after Snowden's revelations, but I think it's less about worry that the US government may have too much access to countries' citizens' data than it is about the insight that if the data is within their borders then they can get it. Oh, I suspect that lawmakers in many countries who are citing the former rationale really mean what they say... but that they're being advised and encourag
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There is also unintended consequences. Say every country demands this where their citizens' stuff is stored on domestic data centers. Now, the government of Elbonia passes a law stating that for anti-"terrorism" purposes, their version of a secret police has to have real time access to all servers, which in addition to a vague law or two about seditious speech, starts getting people tossed into prison.
It is the lesser of two evils. The US isn't perfect, but I can have a banner in a window cursing the Pre
Just an excuse (Score:5, Interesting)
They are cutting their losses, that's all. And considering that there are no prospects for business, there are no reasons to invest into infrastructure.
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You can't pull out if you failed to penetrate. /duck /run
Meanwhile: NSA spying continues (Score:1)
Lazy journalism (Score:5, Interesting)
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Beware of Snowden! (Score:2)
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Perhaps (Score:1)
Russia and Egypt are aware of computer machine intelligence robots run by NGO entities such as, say, a Google engineering staff that can multiply and manipulate comments and stories on social medial to engineer social unrest and revolution by influencing the news cycle and creating a cascading multiplier effect. It's a known known for those who stay aware. Probably run by DARPA and the CIA. Putin learned from Egypt you gotta shut them down if you want to stay in power. The opening moves in a broad geo strat
This is because russia is sexist (Score:1)
and feminists love making sexist men lose their jobs and be blacklisted.
There should be a physical response.
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