Russian authorities, against the backdrop of growing sanctions, intend to abolish criminal…

Russian authorities, against the backdrop of growing sanctions, intend to abolish criminal and administrative liability for the use of pirated software “from countries that supported the sanctions.”

It is expected that such a step will soften the departure of Microsoft, IBM, Oracle and other companies from Russia, writes Kommersant.

According to the “Priority Action Plan to ensure the development of the Russian economy in the context of external sanction pressure”, to support Russian information technologies, a compulsory licensing mechanism is proposed for software, databases and topologies for integrated circuits, which may be subject to Art. 1360 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation (the government of the Russian Federation has the right “in case of emergency” to make a decision on the use of an invention, utility model or industrial design without the consent of the patent holder).
At the same time, the Ministry of Digital Development (participating in the work on the plan) explained that it is proposed to discuss exemption from liability only for products where there are clearly no Russian analogues.
PS The Ministry of Digital Development hastened to declare that it does not support exemption from criminal liability for “piracy.”