If the recently signed Billion dollar trade agreements between Russia and China weren’t a decent enough indication of the growing Bonhomie between two of the world’s biggest powers, the two have now come together to sign a new Cyber-security Pact, wherein the two nations have pledged not to hack into each other’s networks (via WSJ.D).
According to the text of the agreement post on Russian Government’s website, the two countries have signed up an agreement to not conduct cyber-attacks against each other, as well as jointly counteract technology that may “destabilize the internal political and socio-economic atmosphere,” “disturb public order” or “interfere with the internal affairs of the state”.
Apart from the terms mentioned above, Russia and China have also agreed to share information among law-enforcement agencies of both the countries so as to prevent cyber attacks on either side. The two have agreed to exchange technologies and ensure security of information infrastructure.
Russia has been increasingly pushing to ease out its dependence on the west, for both cyber infrastructure and other fronts. Ever since Ukraine happened, western allies, all aligned with the U.S. have pressed Russia with massive sanctions. While this has resulted in economic slowdown for Russia, it has also critically damaged its capability to control its own networks, largely due to lack of support from foreign nations.
Russia is also preparing an action plan in case the Russian segment of the Internet was shut down from the outside, Russian minister of communications Nikolai Nikiforov said last year.
