Cybersecurity firm Kaspersky denies it’s a hazard after the US Commerce Dept bans its software
Cybersecurity company Kaspersky denied on Friday that it is a security risk, after the US Department of Commerce banned the use of its software in the United States.
The Moscow-based company – whose CEO Eugene Kaspersky is Russian – said in a statement that the The decision of the Ministry of Commerce would not impact its ability to sell and promote its cybersecurity products and training in the US
Kaspersky said the government had based its decision on the “geopolitical climate and theoretical concerns” rather than independently verifying whether a risk existed.
The government says from Kaspersky Russian connections mean the company poses an “unnecessary or unacceptable risk to U.S. national security or safety and security.”
The company does much of its business in Russia, and as a Russian citizen living in that country, Eugene Kaspersky himself is subject to Russian law, the Commerce Department said in a June 14 decision that was placed in the Federal Register.
The department said it had considered Kaspersky’s objections to the initial findings of its investigation into whether its products or services posed a threat and concluded that the decision to ban its software was “well supported.” .
Apart from the company’s obligation to comply with Russian laws and decrees, the software could be misused to identify sensitive data of US citizens and make it available to Russian government actors, the ministry said.
“The risks to U.S. national security addressed in this Final Determination do not arise from whether Kaspersky’s products are effective at identifying viruses and other malware, but from whether they can be used strategically to harm the United States,” the report said.
Kaspersky has one of the world’s most popular consumer antivirus products and a research unit widely respected for routinely exposing elite hacking groups.
In 2019, the associated press discovered that an undercover agent had targeted several cybersecurity experts in an apparent attempt to gather information on Kaspersky’s critics.
The company says it cannot intentionally obtain sensitive data about Americans and that its operations and employees in Russia only have access to aggregated or statistical data that cannot be attributed to a specific individual. It said the main impact of the US government’s decision would benefit cybercrime, while also restricting the freedom of consumers and organizations to choose the cyber protection they want.
“We look forward to what the future holds and will continue to defend against actions aimed at unfairly damaging our reputation and commercial interests,” the report said.