US Government Weighing Sanctions Against Kaspersky Lab (cyberscoop.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CyberScoop: The U.S. government is considering sanctions against Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky Lab as part of a wider round of action carried out against the Russian government, according to U.S. intelligence officials familiar with the matter. The sanctions would be a considerable expansion and escalation of the U.S. government's actions against the company. Kaspersky, which has two ongoing lawsuits against the U.S. government, has been called "an unacceptable threat to national security" by numerous U.S. officials and lawmakers.

Officials told CyberScoop any additional action against Kaspersky would occur at the lawsuits' conclusion, which Kaspersky filed in response to a stipulation in the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act that bans its products from federal government networks. If the sanctions came to fruition, the company would be barred from operating in the U.S. and potentially even in U.S. allied countries.

Comments

EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Why you try to reignite cold war? -Vlad

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll continue to use Kaspersky's antivirus because it's the best around and because if the the US government don't like them, then that must mean their shit is secure from the US government.

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[youngone]

The bit that I thought was odd:

If the sanctions came to fruition, the company would be barred from operating in the U.S. and potentially even in U.S. allied countries.

Potentially, I suppose. If those allied countries agree, but plenty of those US allies are wary of the US' courts overreach.
Not my country though, if the CIA tell my government to jump they ask "how high?".

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't care if they get barred from operating in the US, the wonders of the internet still allow me to remain their customer. The US government can't stop me.

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[Joce640k]

The bit that I thought was odd:

There's nothing odd about it.

Their election cheat has been exposed, they want to make sure the other guys can't use the same methods in the next round of elections.

Re: EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's been Trump's plan all along.

1. Ban Kaspersky
2. Get Kapspersky Stock from Putin Golden Shower, allow interwebs d/lof AV.
3. Profit!!!

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[war4peace]

Same here. And guess what, I use Kaspersky AV and it would be impossible for them to stop me (a private citizen) from using it. Sure, the government can ban the usage of the software in their own apparatus, but not in private homes.

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[Anonymous Coward]

In the end the so called US "allies" do what they are told or they can start paying for their own security and come to the realization that the US doesn't have their back anymore. The proles in Europe still do not realize that when the NSA was being attacked for spying on Europe it was the European security agencies who were collecting their citizens data and providing access to the US. And moving all the servers and datacenters to Europe to keep the evil US at bay only makes it easier for the European spy agencies to continue their work. Never mind the fact that the physical location of a networked data center is meaningless but it makes the EU bureaucrats look like they are actually doing something besides churning out regulations designed to extort money from anyone looking to do business in Europe.

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[eaglesrule]

You'll end up having to pay in dogecoins or whatever, since you're going to have trouble using normal payment systems to pay for that Kaspersky subscription. If they can't take you head on, they will always come at you sideways.

Re:EVIL RUSSIANS!!

[war4peace]

Lo and behold, there is such a thing as Kaspersky Free Antivirus.

For working on

[AHuxley]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Stuxnet
Flame
Equation Group https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Android cyber-espionage used by 60 governments.

The internet needs all the security it can get. Why would the US not want quality global security research?

Re:For working on

[Anonymous Coward]

The answer is exceedingly self-evident: the US doesn't want research into its own malware.

Re:For working on

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for posting, mod up! It needs to be revealed that the only real threat to the effectiveness of the US cyber-warfare group is Kaspersky. I'm a patriot, but this sort of blatantly false counter-intelligence is absurd. The US government should hire and BUY Kaspersky Labs, and make them work for us, not whatever this bullshit is.

Re: For working on

[Anonymous Coward]

The quality of being pumped out by the Kremlin is not a virtue.

Re:For working on

[Anonymous Coward]

What's going to happen when the truth about Trump's attempts to get a tower in Russia come to light in the under-oath variety?

Hillary will probably have one of her russian friends sell him a tower, I suppose.

Re: For working on

[Anonymous Coward]

Good job, Billy! $0.50 has been deposited in your Shareblue account.

Re:For working on

[Tom]

Why would the US not want quality global security research?

Because Kasperky could detect the next US-government-sponsored malware. The other malware companies can be "convinced" to play nice.

why would the sanctions have to wait?

[superwiz]

Sanctions, as such, are political acts. They don't have to comport with independent legal proceedings.

Re:why would the sanctions have to wait?

[Xest]

Because they have to judge the impacts.

When Trump threatened tariffs against steel/aluminium, Juncker in the EU being the absolute clueless corrupt prat he is made the same claim about waiting to see if it's worth applying sanctions against US brands like Harley Davidson and Levis.

Levis slipped off the list of possible companies a few days later, presumably because someone pointed out to him that sanctioning an American company that employs quite a few people in Europe (it has a factory in Italy, and stores Europe wide) and that shares European values, pays taxes without avoidance/evasions and disagrees with Trump's tarrifs as much as they do was probably going to be a massive own goal, when instead there are plenty of American companies that sell to Europe but don't have quite as high an employment footprint here which would've been way better targets - US agriculture, raw materials, and such would have made better targets for a counter response to steel/aluminium tariffs.

Still, Trump appears to have rowed back on applying the sanctions to Europe, so there's no need for a trade war between the US and Europe now anyway at least. That in itself is an example of a reason to wait though - the threat alone can sometimes be sufficient for action, what if Kaspersky offered to relocate key elements of it's business out of Russia to the US for example? Actually imposing sanctions would almost certainly never trigger that because it would be too late, threats might.

Re:Moscow Donald - Treason, Obstruction of Justice

[superwiz]

Shut up, Hillary.

Drone to death.

[Anonymous Coward]

We could always do what we do to our enemies. Bomb Kasperskystan.

Re: Drone to death.

[Reverend Green]

Moscow probably has a lot better air defences than our usual targets for military aggression.

Re: Drone to death.

[Anonymous Coward]

Man I heard they're full of viruses.

Re: Drone to death.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure they do. Alllll that hightek Russian shit! Best chronic alcoholics in the world make the best shit.

Re: Drone to death.

[Reverend Green]

All of my geopolitical rivals are drunken incompetents! No one is as cool as ME!

and just for working...

[thesupraman]

Yes, it is also clear that Kaspersky is the only major threat protection software that has not agreed to whitelist US government malware.

Have the US government realise that this is just a form of Striesand effect recommending Kaspersky to anyone who doesnt that the US to know their affairs?

Re:and just for working...

[AHuxley]

Makes a user wonder what a lot of the other EU and US AV brands are doing that the US gov totally approves of?

Re: and just for working...

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck yeah. I love Putin too.

Re:and just for working...

[BlueStrat]

Makes a user wonder what a lot of the other EU and US AV brands are doing that the US gov totally approves of?

They do what they must for a piece of that valuable US/EU/Five-Eyes market.

No different than US tech companies vis a vis China. Just look at how Google is assisting the Chinese government with it's digital tyranny over the population. Just a different authoritarian regime's security service to have to make happy in order to compete with the competition.

Strat

Re: and just for working...

[DNS-and-BIND]

That's why they don't want anyone to be able to install their software. Brand them as enemy spies and run a FUD campaign. The whole thing started when US government malware developers had their half finished malware flagged by Kapersky and auto uploaded for analysis. The intelligence bosses were outraged. How dare anyone protect themselves against the out of control NSA? The angriest person is the slave owner whose slaves attempt to escape.

Re:and just for working...

[Anonymous Coward]

Given that Russia has also been linked to various malware attacks in recent years, including ransomware that doesn't have an endpoint to give you the key even if you pay up meaning it literally just destroys all your data, then why would you expose yourself to that instead? At least Stuxnet is only a threat if you happen to be running a Siemens machinery based uranium refinement facility, which I would assume most people probably aren't.

The idea that they're doing something bad, so we should go with this guy instead is an astoundingly dangerous and stupid mindset. Really, you'd be equally as stupid to use Kaspersky as McAfee if you buy into the state meddling of AV vendors idea - what you really want is someone neutral, i.e. a vote for "None of the above". It's entirely irrational to think "If America is doing it, Russia isn't" - the reality is, if one is doing it, so is the other. When it comes to espionage, you're just a casualty of war for both countries - Russia doesn't give a shit about the suffering of it's own people, so why would it give the slightest fuck about you any more than your own security services?

Re: and just for working...

[eaglesrule]

Apparently it was discovered by Isreali spies. So it fits the pattern of accuse others of that which you are guilty.

Re:and just for working...

[Anonymous Coward]

Really, you'd be equally as stupid to use Kaspersky as McAfee

Philosophically they're equally bad, but technically McAfee and Norton are much worse.

The Agenda

[AlanObject]

It really seems to me that someone or someones high up in the U.S. govt really has it in for Kasperskey. Is that just my impression or does anyone else feel that way?

I would think that if the company actually had any malware in their security products it would have been detected by now. At the end of the day if they were doing Bad Guy Stuff then it would have to write Bad Guy Stuff either to local storage or onto the wire even if it is encrypted. There are a number of automated tools for detecting this both in a simulated environment (VM) and on real hardware.

Has there been any revealing of this kind of behavior that I missed? If not this seems like an awful lot of punishment in the absence of any crime.

So what's the motive here?

Re: The Agenda

[Bing Tsher E]

One would think that if Kapersky software contained malware, the NSA could reveal it and kill the company with a single blow.

Re:The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

It really seems to me that someone or someones high up in the U.S. govt really has it in for Kasperskey. Is that just my impression or does anyone else feel that way?

I would think that if the company actually had any malware in their security products it would have been detected by now. At the end of the day if they were doing Bad Guy Stuff then it would have to write Bad Guy Stuff either to local storage or onto the wire even if it is encrypted. There are a number of automated tools for detecting this both in a simulated environment (VM) and on real hardware.

Has there been any revealing of this kind of behavior that I missed? If not this seems like an awful lot of punishment in the absence of any crime.

So what's the motive here?

That is not how sophisticated state owned malware works. They would not code in obvious malware like spyClass with method uploadSecretsToKGB(). They would bake in a very obscure security 0 day and just let their state sponsor know about it. When it eventually gets compromised it will be patched and they will act shocked. It would probably be a very miniscule security exploit that grants just enough access to compromise another app and then install the real malware payload. This is all assuming that the Russians learned from the NSA/CIA. The US government knows this and that is why they are very careful about which foreign software/hardware/equipment they use.

Re:The Agenda

[AHuxley]

Re "So what's the motive here?"

The problem for the USA and UK is that their gov/mil malware is regional and has to stay hidden.
When discovered the malware also has to look very average.
The UK wants to collect on every computer network in Ireland and all Irish supporters in the USA.

So subtle differences in gov malware only found in the wild in Ireland/USA would get detected by the more advanced AV brands.

The US wants collect it all but different cyber projects do not want to collect within the USA, 5 eye nations.

FBI projects might only collect in the USA and regions of the USA. Under the cover of state and federal task forces.

Globally that adds up to very distinct regional changes in advanced nation state funded malware finding its way into lots of low end consumer computers and networks.

The CIA and MI6 can have very advanced but parallel collection projects than a NSA, GCHQ.
MI5 within Ireland and the UK.

The governments are using contractors to create new malware that looks like average malware so it cant be seen as advanced security service products.
Why use bespoke code once that can be tracked back to the security services when contractors can just use average new malware again and again?
Very average gov malware gets detected globally and regionally by AV brands with skills. Thats the risk.
How to keep gov malware safe? Stop the better AV brands from collecting globally and seeing regional security services malware differences.

Re:The Agenda

[chill]

Yes. They aren't accused of having malware inside their product, but rather that their product sends back hashes of files found on the system. This is normal AV behavior, as they use the hashes to identify known good files from known bad.

However, the accusations were this, combined with the ability to send whole files up for cloud analysis, have been used by the Russian Gov't to identify classified material on U.S. systems and steal files.

While Kaspersky themselves claim no such activities, and that their updates are protected by digital signatures, the accusations are the keys were compromised and the data flows all go thru gov't controlled telecom hubs in Russia.

The ultimate accusation is the software and infrastructure around it can, and has been, used to facilitate espionage.

Whether this is with the willing cooperation of Eugene Kaspersy, the unwilling cooperation, or that he is just a pawn that has little recourse, is all up for debate. The U.S. gov't sees Kaspersky software as a direct security threat, because of the significant possibility of compromise by the Russian intelligence service.

As Russian malware has been found before in critical infrastructure, such as power plants and banks, the U.S. Gov't is pushing for a ban on use of the software in the U.S. to help protect the private sector. A ban on the software in Gov't doesn't go far enough in this regard.

Re:The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the malware out there starts off as a simple beacon to call back home to the mothership via multiple C&C nodes/methods for instructions. It may just only do that as a sleeper. Then when it is needed, only those modules that are needed will be transferred - to save space and avoid giving too much away if detected. It will also keep a look out for virus scanners

Re:The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

Putin has ordered US government to focus on Russian entrepreneurs clean of economic crimes that would have prevented them from running against him at the next elections. Take their clean money from them so that they can't organize a party to stand against Putin's allies. I kid..I kid.

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

The agenda is that the mass media had made a huge anti Russia push because of Trump, and likely Kapersky are one of the few AV vendors they cannot get within their grasp to "whitelist" their spying tools or insert back doors to scan the public's PCs. Considering that no one independently has found anything wrong with Kapersky's software, that leans even more towards the prior agenda. If anything Kapersky might be one of the more trustworthy AVs to use cause god knows what all the other AVs have whitelisted or what kind of backdoors are built into them period.

Re: The Agenda

[DNS-and-BIND]

NSA malware developers had their half finished malware flagged by Kapersky and auto uploaded. This utterly outraged the intelligence bosses. How dare anyone attempt to protect themselves against their weapons? In order to them to control us, we must be defenseless.

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you to the RT correspondent in St Putinsburg for that report.

Re: The Agenda

[rtb61]

Always look at stuff from the professionally paranoid point of view (not an insult, gees they get cranky, just the nature of the job, you have to be professionally paranoid). The US governments wants to use entirely corrupt security letters to put back doors in security software sold to foreigners. Immediately they will suspect foreign governments of doing the same thing, the US does it, why wouldn't Russia or China do it. It has to be careful how it tackles this though, a blanket ban on foreign security software would generate a blanket ban on US security software and wipe out the security letters and back doors, mind you this includes stuff like M$ windows updates, which are now individually packaged, a specific user's computer get a specifically targeted update (only for high level hacks but will get caught if that computer is already being monitored by local intelligence agencies, change in traffic). It would be much cleaner to simply blanket ban all foreign security software and entirely reasonable to do so but the messy bit about US software being banned by foreign countries for exactly the same reason, forces this messy rubbish with Kaspersky. They will be banned one way or another, they will just have to accept that and the Russian government will ban US/EU security software for the same reason.

The only way out, open source the code and any updates and the updates must be served locally, only after the code for the update has been supplied and verified (so you can image open source security software becoming part of FOSS distributions to simplify the issue for everyone). Should the Russian government decide to be really mean, they can simply review copyright law and shorten copyright protection to 25 years from date of first publication and that will hurt the US by far the worst and many other NATO countries will also feel the brunt of that (UK/France). People would just source 60s, 70s and 80s content out of Russia (keep in mind, current movies demonstrate that music from those eras are much more popular than the autotune crap of the last couple decades and movie and TV series have similarly crapped out apart from the odd few exceptions). Of course China would join in, they are not really pleased with the US either and other partner countries would follow suit. So 2018 - 25 = 1993, so youch, makes the Kaspersky ban a joke in comparison and does not hurt Russia and China any where near as much as the US, a tiny fraction in comparison. US want's a trade war, it shouldn't be surprised 'when' it gets kicked in the copyright licence fee crown jewels, software as well. This US would lose far more in copyright licence fees than the entire rest of the world combined.

They can fend that off with a blanket ban on all foreign security software and simply not mention Russia or Kaspersky. Of course Russia and China could still simply extort 'er' bargain the 'Trump' way, to get greater cooperation from the US with the threat of the downward revision of copyright laws (originally 14 years, so very hard to diplomatically argue about 25 years but the money gone, wow, not just revenue but the valuation of assets, from billions to ZERO and that would also hurt the US dollar, a lot).

Re: The Agenda

[houghi]

They are aftet ALL non-American companies. Huawei us another. The US went from "brown people are evil"
"Everybody is evil".

Re:The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's not just your impression. Kaspersky didn't collaborate with US authorities in the way they had imagined. That seems fairly obvious to me.

Unfortunately, it seems not unlikely that they will make a shady deal with besaid authorities in order to save their business.

The funny thing is that it is probably safer for most citizens to give their data to the Russian government than to give it to US authorities. Unless you're a dissident, politician, prominent critic of Russia, or run a company with trade secrets, your personal data should be pretty worthless to Russia.

Re:The Agenda

[butzwonker]

[...] been used by the Russian Gov't to identify classified material on U.S. systems and steal files.

That would justify not allowing Kaspersky as antivirus on government machines that handle classified material. If they have allowed this before that would have been surprisingly stupid. Or does it work like that? "Hey, this machine handles classified data, so make sure to put an arbitrary, foreign anitivirus program on it." That would be stupid.

No, there is more to the story than meets the eye. Kaspersky's cloud service has uploaded NSA malware and they have analyzed it. That's why US authorities are so furious about the company. Even though it seems from their published reaction that Kaspersky Labs have removed the NSA-related signatures under pressure, the company did not go far enough in 'pleasing US authorities'.

Re: The Agenda

[Darkling-MHCN]

The issue is that it's security software with low level access to your system which is controlled by a company which is controlled by Putin. It may not have malware in it now, but of course it has mechanisms in place to enable the distribution of malware very quickly.

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

In all seriousness, RT has less propaganda than all of the US mainstream media. Sad but 100% true.
Also, RT had more coverage of Ron Paul's and Bernie Sanders' presidential runs than all the US mainstream media combined.

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

the US mainstream media

That's nothing, you should take a look at the US "non-mainstream" media some time! They are even more biased and full of propaganda than the "mainstream" media. Many of the "non-mainstream" medias don't even employ journalists! They're literally just web pages with selective copy & paste from unverified other sources such as the "mainstream" medias!

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

In all seriousness, RT has less propaganda than all of the US mainstream media. Sad but 100% true.
Also, RT had more coverage of Ron Paul's and Bernie Sanders' presidential runs than all the US mainstream media combined.

What the fuck is RT?

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

The "wrong" is the KGB has an ear on all suspect malware upload for analysis.

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

If there were backdoors in Kaspersky, that the NSA knew of, they wouldn't be pushing for sanctions, quite the opposite. Just keep the software installed on user computers and use the backdoor for yourself. Or if the backdoor was unusable by a third party, publicize the whole think for Kaspersky to go bankrupt. Pushing for sanctions means they don't have any proof of anything wrong with the software, while fearing it may interfere with their own espionage operations.

Re:The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

It's more than a suspicion. In the Snowden docs, there is a slide from the Canadian spies CSES, and it downright says that they send their malware to AV vendors (presumably for whitelisting). Given Kaspersky's stance on this historically and their reputation (first to discover Duqu, Flame, etc), it entirely likely that they refuse to play ball, and since they're out of country, they can't be forced to comply unlike Symantec and the others.

So yes, they're going after Kaspersky with the same energy they went after Joe Nacchio when he dared question the legality of betraying Qwest customers. Unfortunatelyhttps://yro.slashdot.org/story/18/04/23/217256/us-government-weighing-sanctions-against-kaspersky-lab# for him, he is an American living in the land of the free, so he got 6 years in the slammer for his insolence and uncooperativeness.

Re: The Agenda

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it's only still called KGB in Belarus, in Russia it's called FSB and mainly responsible for domestic security. It is similar to the FBI but with even less distinction between law enforcement/paramilitary/counter-espionage roles. The main intelligence services for espionage on foreign soil are GRU and SRV.

Re: The Agenda

[Darkling-MHCN]

It doesn't need a backdoor. It is the backdoor. Every anti-virus program out there has automatic update functionality. Kaspersky installs by default with "Download and install updates automatically." enabled.... need I say more?

A surprise move stops foes dead!

[Provocateur]

In a politically-correct response, Kaspersky has a new name, which would have far reaching global consequences. They made the stunning announcement before the decision was made official in US courts with regards to the sanctions. A spokesman said that it is not a reaction to other politically charged news -- this was in their plans for two years they said. " We are now known as Kowalski Labs

Re:A surprise move stops foes dead!

[benjfowler]

Yevgeniy ("Eugene") Kaspersky is a Chekist, i.e. an "ex"-KGB spy. He cannot be trusted any more than Putin.

Great News

[Anonymous Coward]

That means they produce an actually secure product! Its so hard to find AVs not already compromised by the unconstitutional spying apparatus that is the NSA in its current state.

Fake news has real consequences

[Anonymous Coward]

Watch out, RT, they may be coming for you next.

Re: How i got my loan from michael cohen company

[Anonymous Coward]

My name is Trump Donald, am from Moscow NY, am so happy right now, my heart is filled with joy and happiness, that is why am here this moment on this site to express my heartfelt gratitude to Michael Cohen Loan Service for granting me a loan of $180,000USD to revive my dying business on the 17th of Febuary 2018, after being turned down by my bank and other financial agencies I visited.first time i went online trying to get the loan from a private loan companies, but all i got from them was bullshit upon bullshit, not until i came across Michael Cohen.

Private sanctions

[Max_W]

What may happen is that people would follow this example and start introducing their own private sanctions. It may hurt international commerce, global division of labor, ideas and goods exchange.

Russia Too Agressive

[Anonymous Coward]

I would be hesitant to install any Russian software on computers. Anyone who manages web facing services and actually bothers to monitor the hack attempts taking place knows that Russians are constantly trying to break into systems. Allowing Russian software to run as a service on critical machines creates a backdoor which makes that process even easier. Of course an antivirus has to be able to access ALL the files on your system. We know the Russians are being VERY aggressive online, so why allow that added risk? I doubt this is about protecting American malware, it's more about preventing a rogue state from being able to access private files.

Re:Russia Too Agressive

[Anonymous Coward]

For me as a European, it's a bit more complicated. I know for a fact from the Snowden leaks that US NSA and the UK GCHQ are extremely aggressive and spy on everyone even in closely allied countries. I have a hunch that Russia and other countries try to do the same, but I do not have direct evidence for that.

As a basis of my actions, I prefer knowledge to assumptions, but tend to act on the basis of both of them.

Re:Russia Too Agressive

[benjfowler]

False equivalency.

Russian intelligence are completely lacking in any kind of humanity and morality, and have zero (ZERO!) legal oversight or restraint on their activities.

Western intelligence are hidebound with law and morality in comparison. That's why the Russians are beating our arses -- they are monstrously immoral, and will do anything to win.

Re:Russia Too Agressive

[Virtucon]

I trust the NSA, FISA, FBI and bulk collection about as far as I could throw them.

Re: Russia Too Agressive

[Anonymous Coward]

The nearest unsecured AWS bucket?

Re:Russia Too Agressive

[benjfowler]

Russia just LOVES useful idiots and fifth columnists like you.

Re: Russia Too Agressive

[Virtucon]

Sorry but if questioning bulk collection, secret courts and the US spying on their own citizens makes me a 5th columnist, pass the borscht comrade. Wake up and read what started all of this too because We aren't the global arbiters of truth anymore.

Pompus twits like you who blindly follow along believing the US is beneficent and can do no wrong will be the death of our constitutional rights all because of terrorists and dem ruskies.

As someone who has just listed Kaspersky products

[Maelwryth]

Why should i be worried again?

This is how you promote a product

[Anonymous Coward]

by being so good that the U.S. government tries to sanction you. Kaspersky can keep U.S. government spying tools out, and so they will try to stop Kaspersky's products from entering as many markets and countries as possible.

If you're dumb you'll instead go with American alternatives, and let Big Gov right in.

Good!

[benjfowler]

I think meat-hooks and piano wire would be the best approach to taking care of Chekists, but harsh sanctions will do in the meantime.

NSS Labs 2018 TOP 20 AV products

[Anonymous Coward]

This has always been a witch hunt. People will believe whatever they have reported to them day in and day out. All they had to do was get the media to report over and over again on how Kaspersky is Bad!, then the bricks started crumbling.

Kaspersky has managed to stay in the top 5 AV products for over 10 years. Not easy.

They were the #1 product for detection rates this year by NSS labs 2018 results, this last week.

Too bad they pissed off the wrong person.

As others have stated, if you want a product that is likely to catch all malware, including ones made by our USA government, keep Kaspersky in your toolbox.

Not white-listing

[DrYak]

US AV brands are doing that the US gov totally approves of?

They are not white-listing Russian malware ?

Same as EU vendors aren't white-listing Chinese malware ?

Slowly reaching the point where going the VirusTotal/MetaScan/etc. route is the best :
throw as many different AV engine at it, and hope that at least one of these engine won't have it on the whitelist mandated by their local government.

Just Ban Windows

[Anonymous Coward]

...in China, Russia, Viet Nam, Brasil, France and every other place which does not want to be spied on by America then. Same argument applies.

Meh. Trump admin will stop this

[WindBourne]

I am guessing that trump admin will stop it if there is any proof at all, that Kaspersky has helped Putin.

Da Efil!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

RT is Russia Today, a web portal the Russians use to spread the truth. They do not need to lie much, just displaying the truth about the multitude of Anglosaxon and Israeli lies is enough to enrage the elite of said countries.

The want the sheeple to consume only their lies and nothing else.

Re:Da Efil!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, indeed some people claim that RT is a kind of successor to Pravda, the main Sovjet state propaganda newspaper, and pravda means truth in Russian. Russia Today is officially government-controlled and broadcasts 'news' in the way the Russian government approves directly from Moscow. To be fair, if I had to choose between Russia Today and Fox News, I'd choose none of them in order to maintain a better and less distorted view of the world.

Sure Moneychanger

[Anonymous Coward]

Whoever does not serve New York must be a KGB man. Never mind he was military intelligence and a patriot.

Re:Sure Moneychanger

[benjfowler]

A Russian "patriot", is by definition, a thug, a thief, a rapist and an enemy of the rest of the human race.

Re:Sure Moneychanger

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure thing, chief.

Another example of a small mind capable of only seeing black and white.

Indeed

[Anonymous Coward]

Russia has dropped lots of nations into bloody civil wars recently:

Iraq 2003
Syria 2013
Yemen 2016

These evil people must be contained !!!

Sure, Boy-man

[Anonymous Coward]

They are super ethical and a good example is how they allowed to kill 100k Iraqis (2003 onwards) for no valid* reason whatsoever. That makes sense.

*except Israel's desire to create a dead zone around them.

Yes Hillary

[Anonymous Coward]

All your paranoid theories are valid. Now take your meds and go back to bed before you break the other leg.

WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

How the f..k can US court ban a foreign company from operating in allied countries????

FUD

[Virtucon]

Kaspersky has worked to uncover some of the worst malware out there and I think that's at the root of this. Why? Because the US has lost some of its best tools for spying, hacking and infiltration because of their work. Does it bother me that they're based out of Russia? No. We still do a lot of business with the Russian gov't and that's what gets lost. Anybody remember the ISS? How do US astronauts get to/from it?

So okay, US Gov't show us your "evidence" show us what the NSA knows about Kaspersky in terms of what backdoors or malware they've infected millions of PCs with. Otherwise shut up and ban Russian Vodka instead.

What law did they break?

[oh_my_080980980]

"The evidence of close ties and cooperation between Kaspersky Lab and the Kremlin is overwhelming..."

Cite a law or fuck off. Useless war mongering Senator....

Re:What law did they break?

[eaglesrule]

If Isreali spies can infiltrate Kaspersky, it stands to reason that the Russian Federation would be able to have spies as well. Their corporate management doesn't necessarily have to have any ties to the Russian government, only that the employees that work there are easily accessible, such as the Kaspersky executives being arrested for treason.

I'm pretty sure that in Russia, treason means anything they want it to mean so that you do what they want.

Re: and once again the chink says everyones as bad

[Anonymous Coward]

So no worried!

Go suck some more foreign cock Strat.

Re: and once again the chink says everyones as bad

[BlueStrat]

So no worried!

Did I say I approved?

I simply pointed out how amoral corporations view the markets and the government intelligence services related to them.

Go suck some more foreign cock Strat.

Not me, that's what the D.C. political elite in both parties do.

Strat

This blocks botnet C&C communication

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject (& far more threats) & ÃPK Hosts File Engine 10++ SR-1 32/64-bit https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=ZYrPWpW_H-ykggel7JLwBg&btnG=Search&q=APK+site%3Astart64.com/

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APK

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I haven't blocked my ass from cdreimer... APK

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject: I love the musty smell of that guy's nutz now when I smell it I get all hot and bothered

He has an insatiable thirst for my ass and in the last 2 nights has dumped like 15 loads of cum in it

Last night I discovered stomping and was put in my proper place

APK

P.S. - I got my second erection in 20 years last night as felt cdreimer's cum dribble out my ass and down my scak. After that he put on some surplus military boots and stomped on my dick until it was limp and one giant bruise... apk

Impersonating & libeling me? lol... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject: No wonder "your kind" can't manage to make something decent (your brains = too weak) like https://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=12022839&cid=56497625/ because you waste your lives "trolling", lol!

* All you KNOW how to do is FAIL - just as you have now here vs. me & yes, in your wasted lives...

APK

P.S.=> YOU do it to yourselves... apk