Beyond well-known (yet insufficiently questioned form a linguistic point of view) samples of quasi-phonetic transcription (Popoff) and transliteration (Popov), the existing practice of rendering Russian proper names into French displays many intermediate cases which have been neither systematized nor described in strict linguistic terms. The author proposes a working classification based on data of French web sites concerning such names as Gorbachev, Etsin, Ekaterinbourg. Among other problems discusses in the paper: difficulties linked to Russian anthroponomical system (patronymics, diminutives, possibility of translating connotated 'meaningful' names in literary texts) and those involved by recent political events in the ex-Soviet are (renaming and autochtonization in toponymy).