It wasn't a physical data breach, so I don't think it would make much of a difference. Presumably, it's a way to force Linkedin (and others) to have a subsidiar

It wasn't a physical data breach, so I don't think it would make much of a difference. Presumably, it's a way to force Linkedin (and others) to have a subsidiary in Russia (legal entity), which can then be sued if there are problems with regards to Russian law. On one hand, I fully understand your concern. I'm in Canada and the local governments pressure companies such as Netflix, Google and others to have registered legal entities here so that they can apply Canadian law (privacy, tax and language requirements). On the other hand, Russia does not have a good reputation with regards to neutral application of the state of law. Furthermore, Russia does not have good privacy laws. Linkedin probably doesn't have the same resources/expertise as they do in the US. (as a Canadian, I never host my client data in the US for this reason.. it's not that the US is so terrible (although it kind of is w.r.t. privacy/NSA-stuff), but if something happens, we don't have the resources to deal with it)