This was an informative article and not filled with hysteria. I thought it was strange that the convict chose to go to prison rather than work for the FSB; it seems irrational to make that choice. Maybe it's hard to stop working for the FSB; can someone add context?

I see Russian computer network exploitation talent being recruited with far better methods than in the U.S., which is hamstrung by strict security clearance requirements, such as criminal records and drug abuse.

From what I speculate from the article, the Russian FSB and GRU manage to use the risky hires by using government contractors as intermediaries, and there compartmentalize information to a degree that the risky hires only know about the operation they perform. It appears that these hackers have a lot of latitude in their operations.

To contrast this with the U.S. model, the only way a person who isn't eligible for clearance to help is to sell their exploit to a broker and the DoD/CIA/FBI eventually buy it. This means only exploit developers even have the opportunity. Computer crime ex-convicts have to join a consultancy for business clients instead, despite having a good skill set.

As the article says, every country's security services need to deal with IT security and need skilled professionals to do it, so everyone recruits. They all recruit naval engineers too.

The Russian gov't reputedly recruiting criminals is a story, but only a small part of this one. The Russian government's aggressive recruiting tactics are somewhat of a story, but probably not specific to this segment of the labor market.

I wonder about the skill levels of the people working for these organizations. On some level it's still a government job and I can't imagine the govt to be able to attract the best of the best.