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Russia Mulling Charging Companies To Use Foreign Software (yahoo.com) 34

Russia may charge domestic companies to use foreign software, the TASS news agency quoted Digital Development Minister Maksut Shadaev as saying on Tuesday, as Moscow seeks to cut dependency on foreign technology and bolster its own. From a report: President Vladimir Putin has made achieving technological independence a key goal, as Western sanctions over the war in Ukraine seek to hamstring Moscow's ability to acquire technology and equipment from abroad that could help it on the battlefield. As part of that push, Putin signed a decree in early May which stated that at least 80% of Russian companies in key economic sectors should transition to using Russian-made software by 2030. Many Russian companies still use foreign software in their daily operations, although an EU sanctions package passed last December prohibits companies from supplying enterprise and design-related software to Russia. Shadaev said that introducing a levy on Russian firms would "equalise" foreign and Russian software.
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Russia Mulling Charging Companies To Use Foreign Software

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  • Putin's shakedown (Score:5, Interesting)

    by robinsonne ( 952701 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2024 @03:06PM (#64506107)
    Putin's starting to get desperate for cash so he's going to squeeze as much as he can get to keep the war funded.
    • My thoughts exactly!

      Either that, or he wants to buy a new villa and sock away more cash in Switzerland.
      • by JustNiz ( 692889 )

        I'm sure he already has a controlling interest in whatever the Russian equivalent of Microsoft is.

    • It's the Russian version of MAGA.
      ALL countries should do this, fund investment into OSS to remove dependance on other countries.
      The EU needs to buy ARM, significantly upgrade its semiconductor manufacturing to improve country of origins options.
      • by sosume ( 680416 )

        > The EU needs to buy ARM

        ARM is British, why should it move to the EU?

        • Since 2016, it has been majority owned by Japanese conglomerate SoftBank Group. Arm Holdings plc. Arm "ABCD" building in Cherry Hinton, Cambridge, England.

          The EU has greater financial backing
          The EU has greater technological ability
          The EU has fabrications plants
          The EU has better privacy/consumer/etc protections
    • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 28, 2024 @04:07PM (#64506261)
      All of the people capable of producing software for Russia are dead, or in prison, or have fled the country so that they don't end up dead or in prison. Good work Vlad.
    • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      desperate for cash so he's going to squeeze as much as he can get to keep the war funded.

      Explains the switch to discount ho's like Tucker and MTG.

    • by Brillenseal ( 4098525 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2024 @06:46PM (#64506569)
      In the Russian's culture, you don't pay for software: you get a pirate version (in most case they wouldn't have the cash anyway). Now, if Putin thinks he can get out of "the free software", that's would indeed just show a complete lack of understanding of the sector... But I don't think it's the case. They more probably will remove a few backdoors, anyway add their own with maybe a beacon, and change the wallpaper: after his recent "management" of the Russian future, I don't think indeed they still have the means to to go any further.
  • by gosso920 ( 6330142 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2024 @03:06PM (#64506109)
    Putzin should just tell his people to pirate the software, like in the old days.
  • sound fair (Score:4, Funny)

    by bugs2squash ( 1132591 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2024 @03:25PM (#64506149)
    This sounds reasonable, after all having Russian software on your system sometimes involves paying a ransom.
  • by Schoenlepel ( 1751646 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2024 @03:46PM (#64506223)

    While this is actually a sensible decision, I wonder how well Russia is actually able to achieve this, with it's economy being geared to war at the moment and a lot of its men dying at the front or tied up in building tanks and guns.

    Another problem Russia faces is a lot of corruption. So, the law may say one thing, but the companies may bribe those needing to check them, or get low quality specialist software to deal with... leading to all kinds of problems.

    • by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      Making software for modern weapons systems is critical, so it needs and has coders, software architects etc just like it has factory workers and weapon system designers.

      Most people forget that Russia and Ukraine both had by far the biggest cybercrime element in the world. And both have been militarized by this point.

      There's a reason why there's a lot of new drones flying. On both sides. Those need custom made software.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        Making software for modern weapons systems is critical, so it needs and has coders, software architects etc just like it has factory workers and weapon system designers.

        So that's why Russia's most advanced air defense systems are routinely eliminated by decades old NATO missiles.
        Russia doesn't have any decent coders software architects etc. And now after so many of those "not up to the task" people have fled. You think the leftovers will be up to scratch? Laughable.

    • by mjwx ( 966435 )

      While this is actually a sensible decision, I wonder how well Russia is actually able to achieve this, with it's economy being geared to war at the moment and a lot of its men dying at the front or tied up in building tanks and guns.

      Another problem Russia faces is a lot of corruption. So, the law may say one thing, but the companies may bribe those needing to check them, or get low quality specialist software to deal with... leading to all kinds of problems.

      Erm... the whole reason Putin is doing this is because he's broke from sending a lot of Russian men to die in Ukraine. Putin is broke and desperate.

      And the inherent corruption is another reason he's desperate for money, all his supporters had their carefully stashed millions frozen, so they need to be paid off too.

  • 1. Respond to sanctions by effectively imposing tariffs.

    2. ???

    3. PROFIT!!

  • Or something like that.
  • Not because they couldn't make hardware, but couldn't make software. Central planning wasn't good at determining customer requirements to deliver software quotas. Not sure if their current system is any better.
    • by sosume ( 680416 )

      The current software stack is the result of a global effort by engineers from all continents. The only way Russia can come close in terms of functionality, security and reliability is by forking existing repositories. Otherwise it's not feasible to even attempt.

  • by LostMonk ( 1839248 ) on Wednesday May 29, 2024 @02:07AM (#64507019)

    8 Years ago, there were some headlines talking about Russia wanting develop their own software and drop US based systems. I wonder where all those made in RU tools are now?
    https://tech.slashdot.org/stor... [slashdot.org]

  • Given his age, he won't even be there by 2030. And since other Russian leaders that may replace him are not as imperialistic, his ambition will most likely die with him.

  • A lot of so-called "Russian" software is actually foreign software with copyrights and logos replaced.

    Granted, truly Russian-developed software does exist.

  • During the 1980s, Brazil heavily taxed all computer imports to “bolster” local production. All it achieved was creating a huge technological gap with other countries.

    This will do basically the same thing for Russia. It's companies will end up with subpar software, greatly harming their performance.

  • The year of the Linux Desktop is finally happening... in Russia. :)

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