U.S. Blacklists Kaspersky Software in Federal Agencies

U.S. Blacklists Kaspersky Software in Federal Agencies

The US government has officially banned the use of Kaspersky security software in all of its federal agencies.

  • Sep 15, 2017

The U.S. government has officially banned the use of Kaspersky security software in all its federal agencies. The security software had been under suspicion for cyberespionage for several months now due to its ties to the Russian government as Kaspersky is required under Russian law to comply with Russian intelligence agency requests.

"This risk that the Russian government, whether action 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. national security," the Department of Homeland Security told the Washington Post.

The software company itself denies the accusations, stating that it "doesn't have any inappropriate ties with any government," and that there is "no credible evidence" to back up the "false allegations." The company said they were being treated unfairly, as it had never helped any government in cyberespionage.

The U.S. government removed the Kaspersky software from its approved vendors list back in July amid speculation of involvement with Russian authorities. Now they have gone so far as to ban it altogether, given federal agencies three months to remove the software.

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