Officials Fear Russia Could Try To Target United States Through Kaspersky AV (go.com)

Russia's growing aggression toward the United States has deepened concerns among U.S. officials that Russian spies might try to exploit one of the world's most respected cybersecurity firms to snoop on Americans or sabotage key U.S. systems, according to an ABC News investigation. From the report: Products from the company, Kaspersky Lab, based in Moscow, are widely used in homes, businesses and government agencies throughout the United States, including the Bureau of Prisons. Kaspersky Lab's products are stocked on the shelves of Target and Best Buy, which also sells laptops loaded by manufacturers with the firm's anti-virus software. But in a secret memorandum sent last month to Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the Senate Intelligence Committee raised possible red flags about Kaspersky Lab and urged the intelligence community to address potential risks posed by the company's powerful market position. "This [is an] important national security issue," declared the bipartisan memorandum, described to ABC News by congressional sources.

Comments

What makes you think they aren't already doing it?

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL,wait, there are people who think Kasperesky isn't compromised? ROFL. Using a respected and renowned cybersecurity first to as a cover seems like a no-brainer to me. I've assumed they were compromised years ago, quite frankly.

Re:All AV Compromised?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Snowden leaks* already showed that malware signatures are submitted to AV companies so that they purposefully do not flag the files.
Frankly, kaspersky, eset, and a handful of others are part of the handful of AVs I trust because they are NOT headquartered in 5 eyes countries.

The Canadian CSES have a slide with a box clearly labeled with EXACTLY this:
"
Commercial/Industry/Relationships
Influence Technology
(provide signature to AV)
"

Re:"Russia's growing aggression toward the USA..."

[LordWabbit2]

Remember, he controls the Russian media.

And your media is all squeaky clean and above board?
I would hold Russia Today in higher regard than ANY of the USA propaganda... I mean media outlets, thank your very much.

That being said I think they are all tools of their respective governments, and they ALL lie!
The days of honest reporting are long gone.