On 1 September 2026, Federal Law No. 243-FZ of 26.07.2026 "On Supporting the Development of Artificial Intelligence Technologies in the Russian Federation" came into force. It changes the legal regulation of artificial intelligence ("AI") in Russia and lays the legal foundation for developing and applying AI technologies. The law:

• divides AI models into ordinary, sovereign (created by a Russian person and running on domestic infrastructure) and national (created by a Russian person but allowing the use of foreign components), depending on the extent to which Russian infrastructure and its components are used;
• gives developers of sovereign and national models access to state support measures (grants, subsidies, tax benefits and simplified access to government data);
• requires owners of large digital platforms (more than 500,000 users per day) to give users the technical ability to label content voluntarily;
• obliges developers and owners of AI models to ensure the safety of their models and to set rules for their operation and decommissioning.

The current version of the AI law does not restrict the use of neural networks, does not introduce mandatory labelling of AI content, and does not address copyright in AI content or liability for violations committed using it.

We recommend analysing your company's status as a developer or owner of AI models and assessing whether it makes sense to obtain sovereign/national model status in order to access state support measures. The C Cases team is ready to help assess your company's compliance with the new requirements and prepare the necessary documents.