A couple of weeks ago, Kaspersky decided to withdraw its lawsuits against Microsoft, after the Redmond giant agreed to implement several changes in the upcoming Fall Creators Update of Windows 10. However, everything points to the Russian developer trading one problem for another, now finding itself in the crosshairs of the US government. The conflict is so big that Eugene Kaspersky went as far as offering the source code of his products, but that was not enough, and the FBI got in touch with several companies to get them to abandon that software.
The story has been simmering for a couple of years, but it was Bloomberg that formalized the accusation with an article titled Kaspersky Lab has been working with Russian intelligence. The text goes on to explain that the firm has over 400 million users, and that half of them don't even know it, thanks to special licenses and the integration of its software into devices like firewalls and servers. Despite the "good" relationship between the superpowers, Kaspersky quickly became a point of friction. Last June, the Senate Armed Services Committee recommended prohibiting the Department of Defense from using Kaspersky products starting in 2018, and a few days before that report, the FBI visited Kaspersky employees in the United States.
In an attempt to not lose the lucrative defense contracts, Eugene Kaspersky went so far as offering source code for audit and testifying before Congress. What's next? The latest information suggests that the FBI contacted several private companies, mainly in technology and energy. In those meetings, the intelligence agency presented different elements linked to Kaspersky that point in the opposite direction of national security interests, among which stands out the accusation of having falsified malware to harm its competitors. The energy sector was "quick" with its cooperation, but the rest of the firms have shown some resistance to the federal discourse.
Kaspersky's stance is very predictable: the company sees itself as a victim of a geopolitical fight, and has repeated ad nauseam that it has no ties with any government. Technically, there is not a single piece of evidence confirming the relationship between Kaspersky and Russian intelligence, but the most likely outcome is that we will see a strategy of reciprocity from the Kremlin.
