Switch to Russian IT and become intellectual customs. Deputy Head of the FCS Denis Tereshchenko - about the main tasks of the department

Denis Tereshchenko: This is a really important question. But it's probably not worth talking about whether there are enough products or not. After all, if you look, register of domestic software Ministry of Digital Science there are a lot of products in certain categories. The question is whether this ON fully satisfies the needs of such large IT customers as, for example,. FCS We are trying to solve the problem of import substitution not due to the quantity, but due to the quality of the existing offer and how much it is equivalent to those import solutions that we, unfortunately, are still forced to apply.

In this matter, we proceed from the decisions of the Chapter. States There is a Presidential Decree of 30.03.2022 No. 166 "On Measures to Ensure Technological Independence and Security critical information infrastructure of the Russian Federation," which prohibits CUES the use of foreign software from January 1, 2025 at critical information infrastructure facilities (). FCS is a subject of CII. This means that all customs authorities will be prohibited from using any imported software from January 1, 2025. And we need to solve this problem in two years.

If we talk about an existing sentence, then for certain components it is. For example, office software: there are at least two Russian solutions that meet our needs. In the field of DBMS, there are also quite good industrial domestic solutions. In particular, Postgres Pro. There are other Russian products of this class that we are considering to replace Oracle. Perhaps for different tasks we will use various Russian DBMS.

It is also important to take into account how Russian manufacturers are able to provide operational technical support. After all, there are many FOIVs that are now engaged in import substitution, and large ecosystems have already been built for global IT products, including many trained specialists who provide professional technical support 24/7. It is important to understand whether our manufacturers are ready to provide the same level of service.

We do not yet have an unambiguous answer and confidence in this issue. By testing Russian solutions and identifying problem areas, we ask the developers questions when these problems will be fixed, and we get the answer that they will put this in their plan.

Denis Tereshchenko: So far I would not call them publicly, but I can say that when faced with such situations, we report this to the Ministry of Digital Science. We do this because, perhaps, within the framework of grant support or support measures that the government provides to Russian IT companies, it is somehow possible to solve such issues by allocating certain funding.

And, summarizing on the issue from which we began, choosing analogues, we consider the situation comprehensively: whether the product meets the characteristics that we need, whether its manufacturers are able to provide the required level of service and support, etc. If they are incapable, then what are the reasons. By identifying these reasons, we are trying to influence them together with the Ministry of Digital Science.

Denis Tereshchenko: It seems to me more difficult with analytical systems - business analytics (BI). There are many Russian proposals here - more than 20, but almost everyone has shortcomings. First of all, they are associated with the volumes of information processed . Unfortunately, now we are still temporarily using the solution from Oracle - Oracle BI, and are looking for an analogue. At least there is an industrial alternative here that is licensed and maintained.

And the biggest problem, in my opinion, is in the area of ​ ​ intermediate layer software - application servers. There are no industrial servers for Russian-made applications now. There are open source solutions that can be found on the Internet and build something of your own based on them. But then it turns out that we are moving away from the industrial solution and depend on the developer who specifically does it for us.

Denis Tereshchenko: The project, of course, is progressing, but we have slightly adjusted our plans. The FCS has a large number of territorial divisions throughout the country, in which many server equipment functioned.

But since then, we have made a conceptual decision to reduce or even completely eliminate data storage in the customs authorities, and raise everything up. We followed the path of centralizing all information resources and a general reduction in the used software by enlarging them, but without losing functionality.

Thus, the equipment that previously functioned in our customs authorities has significantly decreased. Plus, we transferred it to the virtual infrastructure: if earlier we had a server for each task, now it is a hardware and software complex, which includes all our software. Accordingly, the "hardware" on which it is necessary to replace the OS has been significantly reduced. Out of 6.5 thousand hardware servers, 1.7 thousand hardware and software complexes equipped with virtualization environments were obtained at all levels of the information and computing infrastructure of the customs authorities, not taking into account the State Data Center of the FCS of Russia (TPFK, TFK, ET, CED and RTU).

Employee of the Center for Electronic Declaration at the Workplace

Now our equipment works on the OS from Microsoft, and we are looking towards Russian OS based on Linux. There is nothing to choose from anymore. We are looking at alternatives for both personal workstations and servers. At the same time, there are many other software that we need to change to Russian. This includes virtualization environments - you need to move away from VMware. There are Russian options here: for example, "Horizon." All this is in our plans.

Denis Tereshchenko: We are talking about the use of Russian industrial licensed solutions, this will require a significant increase in the budget, without which it is impossible to fulfill all these import substitution requirements. We are talking about 3.8 billion rubles in 2023, 3.2 billion rubles in 2024, and 0.94 billion rubles in 2025 (by order of the FCS of 13.01.2022 No. 7, the total amount of funding for the departmental digital transformation program for 2022-2024. about 23.6 billion^[1] - approx. TAdviser).

There is still such a moment here that, unfortunately, Russian manufacturers are seriously raising prices. Often, their solutions for functionality lose to Western products, and for money they come out much more expensive. We saw from our experience that in 2022 the price of technical support for one of the Russian companies offering an alternative to foreign DBMS increased by about 2 times compared to what was announced to us last year.

Denis Tereshchenko: According to different components of ICT solutions, the level of dependence is different. Somewhere it is maximum, somewhere 50/50, but somewhere there is no dependence at all. For example, we do not have dependence on imported solutions in the field of information security: we use 100% only Russian products, and initially followed this path. Including this made it possible to painlessly pass all cyber attacks on our information system, including external resources, despite the fact that some FNIVs had many problematic issues.

If we talk about telecom, then we also do not see serious questions, because there are very good Russian solutions, for example, from Novosibirsk manufacturers. They have products - a 100 percent replacement for Cisco. Now we are testing trunk routers with a large amount of traffic, but the final tests show that this is also all interchangeable. With the necessary additional funding, we do not see any problems to completely get away from the solutions of the American company Cisco on Russian analogues.

Our greatest dependence is now on the OS and DBMS. But here the problem is connected not only with the need to find additional funding, but also with the need to process all our software, which was originally created for the system products of American suppliers. Oracle DBMS was originally our standard.

Denis Tereshchenko: Yes, like the majority. We have very large systems, under 7 PB data. Now we have to contact application developers and rewrite our software, in fact, to modernize our entire software information system.

Denis Tereshchenko: This is information about customs operations that have taken place on the territory RUSSIAN FEDERATION since 1995. It is used, firstly, for our own activities: what, how and by whom is imported, etc. We also provide the necessary information at the request of law enforcement agencies, interested departments, including at the request,,. Ministry of Finance Ministry of Economic Development Rosstat The Ministry of Digital Industry has also recently begun time to actively request information, mainly reports on what is related to. This data electronics is used, among other things, in the development of various measures to support business.

Denis Tereshchenko: A single data center is the heart of our UAIS. We began to create it in 2018 by decision of the President of the Russian Federation, who supported our initiative, and in September 2022 we completed construction. We designed separately for the IT infrastructure of the data center and the engineering infrastructure. As part of the IT project, the contractor was tasked with analyzing the Russian solutions available at that time for use in our data center to replace them with imported ones.

In the State Data Center of the Federal Customs Service of Russia

Equipping the data center with computing equipment goes in 3 stages: the first was completed in 2021, the second should be completed this year, and the third in 2023. At the end of all stages, we assume that about 40% of all equipment in the data center will be Russian. This includes telecom equipment and IB, SHD systems.

The remaining 60% is equipment that cannot yet be found. These are predominantly very high-performance systems. According to statistics, the FCS processes approximately 840 million operations per day in the data center, i.e. about 10 thousand operations per second. Our information system works around the clock.

An important detail should be noted here: our new data center has a total of 108 racks. This was a limitation in terms of the selection of computing equipment that can be placed in an accessible area. Potentially, you can find a replacement for imported high-performance computing equipment by increasing the number of Russian equipment and creating appropriate PAC based on it. But this requires more space, more energy consumption, much more air conditioning systems and the recycling of all our software, which is now not adapted to work in such an architecture.

Denis Tereshchenko: Earlier, the Russian government approved the FCS Development Strategy until 2030 and the corresponding plan for its implementation. The main goal is to move from digital to intellectual customs. Therefore, we continue to work consistently to implement new digital intelligent services.

To date, we have automated all customs processes and established electronic interaction with all their participants. For example, we use technologies such as automatic release of product batches. This means that the system decides on the possibility of issuing a commodity batch without human participation. At the same time, during the period of the lowest load, the system makes a decision in 30 seconds, the maximum time during the larger load is 2 minutes. And the inspector, according to the law, is given 4 hours for this.

Now we are implementing projects in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). For example, intelligent analysis of images that take mobile inspection inspection complexes at the border. Without actual opening, they shine through vehicles - trucks. Usually, the images received are watched by a person, checking how much what is stated according to the documents corresponds to what is actually transported.

Novorossiysk customs, port of Novorossiysk, mobile inspection and inspection complex

The mining system of these images, which we are now developing, will itself decide how much what is in the image corresponds to what is stated in the documents. We have already trained the machine to analyze about 50 product groups. Somewhere already she correctly identifies the product with 100% reliability, and somewhere so far 50-60%. But we're working on it.

In the future, this solution is planned to be used at an intelligent checkpoint, where the vehicle will not even stop.

Denis Tereshchenko: It is difficult to say, because we cannot double-check for every inspector. We proceed from the fact that we trust the officials who do this, because these are their official duties. But, turning to the use of AI, we, firstly, multiply the speed of decision-making and, secondly, exclude the possibility of the very human factor. We also seriously minimize costs in this regard.

Denis Tereshchenko: The commodity nomenclature of foreign economic activity (VED) includes 99 commodity groups in total. Now we have worked out about 50%, and by the end of 2023 we plan to carry out this work on all commodity groups. We plan to check 100% of the cargo in this way, and this is our highest priority project in 2022 and 2023.

Denis Tereshchenko: Customs ensures the economic security of the Russian Federation, and at checkpoints it is necessary to exclude the import of prohibited goods. If, for example, the system tells us that there may be some prohibited cargo in the vehicle, or the information stated according to the documents does not correspond to what the system saw, then the inspector is connected. It carries out actual control and inspection of the cargo. So our officials will not be without work.

Denis Tereshchenko: In addition to the project, which I have just described in detail, another priority is the revision of our risk management system next year and the transition from object analysis of foreign economic activity participants to intellectual analysis using AI elements.

I.e. we will analyze the product lots, and we are not talking about scanning here. The point is that the participants in the foreign trade, declaring the goods, declare a lot of information about it: country of origin, cost, description of the goods, etc. The current risk management system works out each of these declared elements separately, and prompts when something wrong is detected. For example, goods from Germany are unlikely to go Russia to through. And Kyrgyzstan our task in 2023-2024. - consider all these separate indicators in aggregate, including using elements of AI. It is noteworthy that the initiator of this project is the head of the Federal Customs Service. He Vladimir Ivanovich Bulavin takes an active part in digitalization issues, and this project is under his control.

We also have an interesting project to equip cars of mobile groups with photo and video recording cameras with machine vision technology.

Cameras with machine vision can recognize the registration numbers of vehicles that go with cargo, and check against our information resources in terms of what kind of carrier it is, whether there were any violations of customs legislation on its part before. If necessary, an employee of the mobile group can stop and selectively check the vehicle.

Denis Tereshchenko: Of course, the number of cyber attacks has grown significantly. Their focus has changed if we consider external information resources on the Internet. If earlier these were fairly standard frontal DDoS attacks, now we are talking about social engineering. This affected not only us, all federal authorities were faced with the fact that in various channels, information was sent on social networks with an offer to users, for example, to follow links and get to information resources.

Usually, a DDoS attack can be minimized by blocking the IP address from which traffic flows, and in the case of user calls, a multiple increase in unique connections to our Internet resources is obtained. As a result, we were forced to block access to them from IP addresses that do not belong to the countries of the Eurasian Union.

If we talk about the information system of the customs service at all, this is a closed system and connection to it via the Internet is prohibited. Access to it from the outside is protected by a number of equipment through which an attacker cannot pass. Plus, we have our own information security systems developed specifically for us. Due to this isolation of the UAIS, we successfully repelled all the attacks that were.