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Under Pressure, Western Tech Firms Including Cisco and IBM Bow To Russian Demands To Share Cyber Secrets (reuters.com)

Posted by msmash on from the folding-up dept.

An anonymous reader shares a Reuters report: Western technology companies, including Cisco, IBM and SAP, are acceding to demands by Moscow for access to closely guarded product security secrets, at a time when Russia has been accused of a growing number of cyber attacks on the West, a Reuters investigation has found. Russian authorities are asking Western tech companies to allow them to review source code for security products such as firewalls, anti-virus applications and software containing encryption before permitting the products to be imported and sold in the country. The requests, which have increased since 2014, are ostensibly done to ensure foreign spy agencies have not hidden any "backdoors" that would allow them to burrow into Russian systems. But those inspections also provide the Russians an opportunity to find vulnerabilities in the products' source code -- instructions that control the basic operations of computer equipment -- current and former U.S. officials and security experts said. [...] In addition to IBM, Cisco and Germany's SAP, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co and McAfee have also allowed Russia to conduct source code reviews of their products, according to people familiar with the companies' interactions with Moscow and Russian regulatory records.

3 of 111 comments (clear)

  1. Code audits shouldn't be suspicious by Hentes · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They should be standard procedure by every authority dealing with security sensitive systems.

  2. Re:Fake red scare by AutodidactLabrat · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Well, except for the DAILY new information supporting the Trump - Putin - Hacker - Election axis, yes, that means everyone NOT in the Faux "News" moonbat directory.
    Daily
    With former FBI, NSA and CIA directors acknowledging the One Party Promoting Hacks

  3. Re:I'd want to know, too. by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Who says they haven't? My guess is the NSA has looked at the code...

    The NSA doesn't report bugs and vulnerabilities back to the tech company.

    If I had a choice of disclosing my source code to either the Russians or the NSA, I would pick the Russians.