European Lawmakers Vote to Ban Kaspersky Lab Products

[LASER_oneXM]

Content source

https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/european-lawmakers-vote-ban/

In a plenary session of the European Parliament that will be held today in Strasbourg, France, members of the European Parliament (MEPs) will vote on a motion for resolution which includes a clause to ban the use of software programs "that have been confirmed as malicious, such as Kaspersky Lab."


This particular ban clause is included in A8-0189/2018 [1, 2, 3], a motion proposed to the European Parliament by its Foreign Affairs Commission.


The motion's purpose is to establish general guidelines for an EU-wide strategy on cyber defense. In the motion's lengthy body, there is also a clause that addresses public-private partnerships.


According to clause #76, if the motion passes as proposed by the Foreign Affairs Commission, EU states will be called upon and expected to review and ban software programs that have been confirmed as malicious.

Motion explicitly mentions Kaspersky as malicious software

The motion's text matter-of-factly refers to Kaspersky products as "confirmed as malicious," following the lead set by the US last year.


76. Calls on the EU to perform a comprehensive review of software, IT and communications equipment and infrastructure used in the institutions in order to exclude potentially dangerous programmes and devices, and to ban the ones that have been confirmed as malicious, such as Kaspersky Lab;

"The wording ('confirmed') is interesting, but to fully appreciate it you need to be aware this report has its origins in the Foreign Affairs Committee where words like that matter," Dr. Lukasz Olejnik, an independent cybersecurity and privacy policy advisor, told Bleeping Computer yesterday.

 

[Dhruv2193]

They shouldn't ban it as it is one of the top quality software

 

[Poccie]

This has nothing to do with the quality of the software i'm afraid. This is a simple and oldskool East vs West play. From an EU standpoint, banning Kaspersky (regardless of my personal opinion) is a logical step. Kaspersky is a russian company and therefore has to follow Russian law. If that means that Russian Intelligence could take over the company and use Kaspersky instances for spying activities, the risk for the EU/US is simply to big.
This has nothing to do with the good intentions of Kaspersky or the quality of their product, it's simply risk management on a Geo-Political level.
And to answer any remarks about Trend Micro, Symantec en McAfee being NSA controlled spyware tools. Even if that would be true, being spied on by a NATO partner is still by far a better choice out of two bad options.

 

[Sundaram999]

it's paranoia

 

[Sundaram999]

This has nothing to do with the quality of the software i'm afraid. This is a simple and oldskool East vs West play. From an EU standpoint, banning Kaspersky (regardless of my personal opinion) is a logical step. Kaspersky is a russian company and therefore has to follow Russian law. If that means that Russian Intelligence could take over the company and use Kaspersky instances for spying activities, the risk for the EU/US is simply to big.
This has nothing to do with the good intentions of Kaspersky or the quality of their product, it's simply risk management on a Geo-Political level.
And to answer any remarks about Trend Micro, Symantec en McAfee being NSA controlled spyware tools. Even if that would be true, being spied on by a NATO partner is still by far a better choice out of two bad options.

The whole democracy of the West boils down to going and democratic buying pants in the market. In all other respects, there must be control over democracy... People should be free in their choice. Including software for the PC/device

 

[upnorth]

to be clear, the proposed EU ban, if approved, applies only to the use of "dangerous programs" inside EU institutions and does not target the EU commercial software market. In the EU, the biggest repercussion of this proposed ban will be Kaspersky's relationship with Europol, which in the past has resulted in the arrest of countless cybercriminals and the creation of the NoMoreRansom project.

Today, the EU Will Vote If to Ban Kaspersky Products From Official EU Networks

 

[jogs]

Ban MS, Google, FB ??

 

[RejZoR]

Let me get this straight. They are gonna vote on banning Kaspersky off EU networks because they (Kaspersky) found an NSA contractor who was handling hack tools and now Kaspersky is somehow to blame because they were doing their job. Has any of the idiots from EU bureaucratic machine or the mainstream media parroting same bullshit educated on how cloud systems work in antiviruses? Like, even the bare basics? Nope. Lets just blame Kaspersky. Because reasons. I wonder who they'd blame if avast! found it instead of Kaspersky. Who would they blame then?

 

[yitworths]

Ban MS, Google, FB ??

what the heck are you asking for? they are good buddies of our beloved CIA & NSA, How come you even ask for that.

 

[mlnevese]

Well... after they ban Kaspersky they should also ban:

Masha and The Bear... it's obviously using subliminal messages to indoctrinate our children...
Fifa World Cup 2018... Well it's in Russia...

In a more serious note I can understand the paranoia of having Russian/American/Chinese software in mission critical and government systems but the fact is most countries do not have locally developed security software so either ban all 3 major players or learn to live with the risk that any piece of software may be weaponized...

 

[JB007]

Hello,
I also think that's a great paranoia.
I don't think that lambda users like me have to fear Kaspersky hypothetical spying :emoji_innocent:

 

[RoboMan]

6/13/2018 EU has voted to BAN Kaspersky's products
6/14/2018 EU has voted to replace Kaspersky's products with McAfee's products
6/20/2018 EU warns whole Europe to beware about ransomware that's spreading all around the continent and nothing can stop it

 

[yitworths]

6/13/2018 EU has voted to BAN Kaspersky's products
6/14/2018 EU has voted to replace Kaspersky's products with McAfee's products
6/20/2018 EU warns whole Europe to beware about ransomware that's spreading all around the continent and nothing can stop it

Yo've just summed up this whole facade.

 

[jogs]

Some one needs to fill some pockets :emoji_money_mouth:

 

[upnorth]

6/14/2018 EU has voted to replace Kaspersky's products with McAfee's products.

Yuck. There goes the neighborhood.

 

[Pelocha]

They shouldn't ban it as it is one of the top quality software

They should not ban Colombian cocaine with that logic. Top quality cocaine.

 

[ForgottenSeer 69673]

What does the NSA use these special tools for anyway? I thought they were supposed to be used to gather info on other countries that are not the USA's friends. In other words for National Security. Things went very south when Russia annexed Crimea.

 

[Deleted member 178]

Ban it ! ban it ! ban it !!!!!

Spoiler: ban iiiiiiiiiiiiiitttttt ! ban iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit ! Ban iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit

 

[yitworths]

Now It seems this thread is gonna be little heated up. Btw, why are not all russian products banned? I mean dr.web,yandex & so on. Why just Kaspersky. Food for thought mate

 

[212eta]

Ban Kaspersky while leaving Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and the rest CIA/NSA affiliates intact?
Such a Hypocrisy!
E.U. has been led by the U.S. policies.