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US Agency Revokes All State Discounts For Kaspersky Products (thebaltimorepost.com)
The U.S. General Services Administration has removed Kapersky Lab from its list of approved vendors for federal systems, which also eliminates the discounts it previously offered to state governments. Long-time Slashdot reader Rick Zeman writes:
"The agency's statement suggested a vulnerability exists in Kaspersky that could give the Russian government backdoor access to the systems it protects, though they offered no explanation or evidence of it," reports the Washington Post. Kaspersky, of course, denies this, offering their source code up for U.S. Government review... "Three current and former defense contractors told The Post that they knew of no specific warnings circulated about Kaspersky in recent years, but it has become an unwritten rule at the Pentagon not to include Kaspersky as a potential vendor on new projects."
"The lack of information from the GSA underscores a disconnect between local officials and the federal government about cybersecurity," the Post reports, adding that "the GSA's move on July 11 has left state and local governments to speculate about the risks of sticking with the company or abandoning taxpayer-funded contracts, sometimes at great cost."
The Post also quotes a cybersecurity expert at a prominent think tank -- the Center for Strategic and International Studies -- who believes that "it's difficult, if not impossible" for a company like Kaspersky to be headquartered in Moscow "if you don't cooperate with the government and the intelligence services."
"The lack of information from the GSA underscores a disconnect between local officials and the federal government about cybersecurity," the Post reports, adding that "the GSA's move on July 11 has left state and local governments to speculate about the risks of sticking with the company or abandoning taxpayer-funded contracts, sometimes at great cost."
The Post also quotes a cybersecurity expert at a prominent think tank -- the Center for Strategic and International Studies -- who believes that "it's difficult, if not impossible" for a company like Kaspersky to be headquartered in Moscow "if you don't cooperate with the government and the intelligence services."
"...they're going to use Symantec? Score!"
https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/a...
Re "No AV vendor will allow known government malware .. through."
The US did consider that for Magic Lantern.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
For those of you not familiar with Swedish politics, the Sweden "Democrats" are anything but. They're right-wing/racist/ultra-nationalist, with their origins in the White Power movement and the Swedish Nazis. (Fun fact: Sweden never outlawed the Nazi Party.) They're a minority in the Riksdag, and every other party with seats refuses to co-operate with them on any matter.
The irony here is that SD are anti-EU and pro-Russian and they're attempting to score political points pretending to be against something that damages the EU and benefits Russia.