New Russian Law Bans Gadgets Without ‘Homemade’ Software

Over the last 10 years, we have certainly seen a divide growing again between the West and Russia. I mean, we’ve never exactly been the best of friends, but feelings of mutual distrust seem to be building quite significantly from both sides.

In a report via the BBC, however, a new law recently passed in Russia may have a significant impact on the technology market. Put simply, as of Summer 2020, all gadgets sold in Russia must include software that has been home-produced (or at least modified) in the country.

Russia Issues Software Law

The new law, that will come into effect in June 2020 will not necessarily ban the sale of foreign technology. It will, however, require that they contain software that has either been designed or modified by Russian based software technicians.

This will include items such as computers, tablets, smartphones, smartwatches, and pretty much anything related that has been designed in the West. This may, however, create some serious problems.

Why Have They Passed This Law?

Supporters of the law say that it will help build and grow the development of Russian software companies. Specifically, so that they can ‘bespoke’ it for their native users (and language).

Personally, I think it just boils down to the whole aforementioned ‘mutual distrust’. Let’s face it, we’re not blameless ourselves here. We constantly see stories and rumors about Russian hacking and spying. It would, therefore, only be natural to presume that they may think that we’d attempt to do the same (which we probably are).

Tech companies such as Microsoft, Google and Apple, however, are clearly going to be a bit reluctant to let Russian software engineers tinker with their operating system source codes. This is definitely going to get more than a little interesting when the law comes into effect.

What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!