The Biden administration is set to make plans public to prohibit the selling of Kaspersky Labs’ antivirus software in the US.
According to a person with knowledge of the situation, the company has a sizable U.S. clientele that includes state and municipal governments as well as providers of vital infrastructure.
Newsng understands that the cybersecurity company’s reputation will be further harmed and its international sales may be impacted by the addition of the company to a trade restriction list that will come along with the ban.
In recent months, there have been increasing allegations of intimate ties between Kaspersky and the Russian government.
Some claims suggest the corporation is actively cooperating with the FSB, while others assert that Russian intelligence has hacked the company’s goods for its gain, according to insider sources.
In any case, authorities are becoming more and more worried that Kaspersky’s goods pose a threat to national security.
According to two other sources familiar with the case, the Trump administration plans to use its extensive powers to implement a sweeping new rule that would also add the company to a list of companies subject to trade restrictions.
This step may severely damage the company’s reputation and negatively impact its sales abroad.
The timing and specifics of the software sales ban, as well as the intention to include the cybersecurity company on the entity list—which essentially prevents U.S. suppliers from selling to a corporation—have not been made public before.
“The case against Kaspersky Lab is overwhelming,” said Senator Jeanne Shaheen. “The strong ties between Kaspersky Lab and the Kremlin are alarming and well-documented.”
The U.S. administration imposed sanctions on 500 Russian organizations earlier in February, aimed at the military-industrial complex and businesses that support the war effort.
The economic sanctions that Western countries placed on Russia despite these actions haven’t had the desired impact of putting an end to the conflict in Ukraine.
We earlier reported that the International Criminal Court’s prosecutors are looking into claims that Russia conducted cyberattacks on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, committing war crimes in the process.
