Russia is struggling to fill up nearly 100000 vacancies in its IT sector, as specialists in the field pack up and make plans to leave the country for greener pastures. One of the ways the semi-presidential republic plans on countering the issue? Filling the gaps with prison population.
According to Krebs on Security, it was the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service that announced last month that it would make use of incarcerated IT Specialists. Technically speaking, these IT-savvy inmates would be working under forced labour rules, serving as remote workers for Russian commercial companies.
The Russian Association for Electronic Communications (RAEC) estimates between 70000 and 100000 IT Specialists have left Russia or are leaving the country for better positions, in countries such as the US, Germany, Georgia, Cyprus, and Canada.
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It is currently unclear as to how many IT specialists are currently serving time inside Russia’s prisons, or just how capable they are at the job. That said, if the Russian Penitentiary service is able to do that, it’s not a stretch of the imagination that there is more than a handful of prisoners that have history or experience in the field, prior to their convictions.
(Source: KrebsonSecurity, Techspot)
