SAP continues to support Russian customers SAP is continuing to support Russian businesses and government-owned organisations as war rages in Ukraine. The German software giant has sold enterprise systems to Sberbank, Aeroflot, and other Russian businesses but, despite the widely condemned invasion of Ukraine, it continues to support such installations. In a statement …
The lure of the almighty dollar doesn't care about war or politics.
Companies, including tech companies, are viewing this as a sales blip. They are almost all planning to minimally comply with sanctions and maintain whatever existing relationships they have so that their businesses can jump back in as soon as they can.
Pausing software sales doesn't do much. Pausing software support would do a bit more but how many companies here are running antiquated software.
If you want an effective sanction, have AWS and other database providers lock all Russian data - no write, no read, nothing.
For companies to say "we can't just stop taking their money, we've got a contract" makes me want to puke.
Cut them off now and see them in court, one day, maybe.
While I'm here, can I again plug the idea of making "ghost bookings" on Airbnb for properties owned by individuals in Ukraine.
I've booked a week in Odessa with Lidiya - won't be turning up obviously, but she will get the money and Airbnb are waiving their fees.
Yep not only are there scammers trying to take advantage of such generosity, there are probably hackers stealing actual Airbnb profiles and redirecting the payments to their own accounts.
Hopefully Airbnb are putting some pretty strong protections into place for houses in Ukraine to prevent contact/banking info being changed without some really good verification.
Cut them off now and see them in court, one day, maybe
Exactly! Where they gonna sue? If they sue in Russia, you just ignore it because they can't do anything to a non-Russian company. If they sue in the US/UK/EU then legislators need to pass laws saying such suits will be immediately tossed.
"Thomas Watson chose to tabulate the Nazi census, to accept Hitler's medal, and to fight for control of Dehomag. And he made other equally indefensible choices in his years of doing a profitable business counting Jews for Hitler—choices that are described in IBM and the Holocaust by Edwin Black."
-- https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/hitlers-willing-business-partners/303146/
I've been wondering since the start of this if targetting the UK sanctions at all Russian nationals rather than certain individuals would create a Russian backlash against Putin (which is whats needed - get the people to get get rid of the madman).
Would freezing all Russian assets work?
Given prpopoganda in Russia has indoctrnated them that NATO caused this war then probably not. But its worth thinking about. Plenty of rich Russians will have investments in London they cant afford to lose just cos their overlord lost his stuffing marbles . . . .
Bit of a dilemma; they really should stop supporting existing deployments of Windows (desktop), yet the side effect of not getting the updates would mean Russian Windows users would have a more stable desktop..
Perhaps an appropriate security and feature update would be for MS to include a Tor install for Edge, so by default when users open Edge they get the news from outside Russia splashed across their screens and a Favourites button for the BBC Tor site.
Pondering where the line is between assisting an evil regime and siphoning out some cash.
IBM supplying the machines to administer the burrecratic needs of the holocaust was well on the evil side of the line.
SAP providing tech support to Aeroflot, less evil, and possibly somewhat effective at increasing pressure, as long as they receive payment in Euros, pounds, or US dollars, it seems like anything that causes outflows of hard currency and no inflows of military importance could hurt Russia in the medium term.
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