There are lot's of myths about Russia, and there are even books solely dedicated to their debunking. I'd say that most popular myth about Russia (at least at Quora) is that there was a slavery in Russia till 1861 and it was installed by Peter the Great.
The truth is that Peter the Great totally abolished slavery in Russia in 1723 finishing job of his father czar Alexis the 1st, who initiated the reform partially tras*fering debt slaves and hereditary slaves- zakupy and kholopi - into the the status of serfs in 1679 thus greatly increasing they legal status and quality of life at the expense of their debt-owners.
At the same time due to lack of goverment officials and lack of budget to recruit them both nobles and common folk were subjected to mandatory state obligations - recruit obligation - "rekrutskaya povinnost'" - was the heaviest. Nearly all the able body noblemen were drafted to military or civil cervise since the age of 14-16 basically for life and 3/4 of them served at non-officer positions as soldiers, sailors and marines. There even was a time in early 1730s when only noblewomen and crippled noblemen could legally govern their estates.
Peasants were put into the system of serfdom - "krepostnoye pravo" - which delivered fiscal, administrative and legal state functions to local noblemen, while noblemen themselves were controlled by local governors and self-governing societies - "dvoryanskoye sobranie" - noblemen assembly. Murder of serf was considered (at least in theory) as a major crime. Peasant serf could also be assigned to work at state-controlled military factory or monastery.
Peasants freedom of movement was officially limited - one could not legally change his owning nobleman or enterprise and some of peasants were also subjects for military draft for life but only "1 of 100 souls" actually was supposed to be drafted (again in theory). However, as per agreement with his owner, serf could move around the country for business purposes, could be business owner even as large as factory, and sometimes could even avoid taxation associated with that business due to his status.
And last but not least at the same time a "Table of Ranks" was introduced - a set of rules describing in details how exactly one could rise from serf to hereditary nobleman position by service in the army or pursuing of civil carreer. This system led to a situation when place of Chief of Russian Imperial Staff in WWI was occupied by general M.Alexeev who was a son of peasant-born V.Alexeev, who in turn became captain during Crimea War. Another instance is Vladimir Ulyanov aka Nikolay Lenin - who was heredetary nobleman due to successfull civil service of his father, while his grandfather was also peasant turned to be town resident and business owner.
So Russian brand of serfdom (which was a terrible thing of course) sometimes was harsher to serf-owners than to serfs themselves, and can be compared to well known phenomen of indentured servitude. The harshest version of this system implementation was during 1720-1800 And it was abolished in 1861 mostly as soon as State gained enough educated goverment officials to take full responsibility of population.