The US Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that they are “concerned about the ties between certain Kaspersky officials and Russian intelligence and other government agencies.” The statement continues, asserting that “the risk that the Russian government, whether acting on its own or in collaboration with Kaspersky, could capitalize on access provided by Kaspersky products to compromise federal information and information systems directly implicates U.S. The ban cites concerns stemming from Kaspersky’s potentially playing a role in cyberespionage activities sponsored by the Russian state. And the first of these cyber consequences has already had its effect.Īfter years of suspicion and months of investigations, on Wednesday the US government issued a ban on the use of Kaspersky cybersecurity software by federal agencies. We’ve already discussed this in our PandaLabs Predictions Report for 2017 when we singled out the growing ambition of governments to gather enormous quantities of data that could be valuable to their national interests. This can no doubt have huge - and serious - consequences in the field of cybersecurity. Threats of commercial warfare, espionage, and sanctions are constantly threatening to polarize two major world powers - the United States and Russia - and embroil them in perpetual conflict. We are living through one of the most precarious moments in international relations of the last several years.

Kaspersky kremlin