Page 4 - Kaspersky Software News Today

Related to russian intelligence. this seems to be the first reported incident of a granular instance the products were used by russia to conduct espionage in the u.s. is that right? >> thats right. for years intelligence officials had this suspicion and these fears and what we are seeing now is essentially a case study of exactly how they worried that kasp kaspersky could be used by hackers in russia to find ways into information systems in the united states and you alluded to the banning of sof...

Specific but if you look at the hypothetical scenarios that are laid out in the statement accompanying that ban theyre exactly parallel to what investigators believe happened here, that kaspersky was a scout to find files for the russian hackers they might be interested in and hone in on the particular contractor as you noted made the violation of taking classified material home with him from his office at the nsa. >> and, shane, can you tell us from your reporting if kaspersky software was able...

Of the implications that it helder if other agencies running the software or contractors or employees might have it at home and the kind of school tools and the computer code the nsa uses to spy on other countries. i mean, if you like, analogize them to the tools for spying or the methods for spying. when this kind of thing gets into an adversarys hands, it tells them how to defend their networks to gain information from them and potentially to take the tools and use them against other countries...

It defends networks inside the united states. that would seem to be very valuable information for the russians to have from our nsa. the russians reportedly got access to the valuable, highly classified information after an unidentified nsa contractor took material home from work an put it on the home computer. that was his first mistake. second mistake, according to the journal, the hackers working for the russian government, quote, targeted the contractor after identifying the files they wante...

National intelligence and the nsa chief all personally asked if they would use the software on their own computers. the answer -- down the line, from fbi, cia, dni, uniformly, the answer was, neit, neit, no way. no. kaspersky denied theres any reason to work and not an instrument aft russian government. in july, nbcs richard engel interviewed the ceo of the lab who it should be noted was trained by the kgb. but he claimed any cooperation with the kremlin was purely defensive in nature. >> never ...

>> never been asked to cooperate in an offensive operation with russian intelligence? >> zero. we are cooperating with the russian agency responsible for the cyber crime investigations. not with their spying, not all their -- we get defensive part. not with offensive. zero contacts with offensive agencies in russian intelligence. >> well, today, he responded to the report about theirv. in an incredibly offensive russian intelligence operation targeting the nsa calling it a false accusation. what...

Software made by russia -- based kaspersky labs. big company. millions of dollars of sales in the united states. but last month you might remember the government ordering anti-virus software off all u.s. government computers. due to alleged links of kaspersky and russian intelligence. you might remember there was a hearing in may, the director of national intelligence and the nsa chief all personally asked if they would use the software on their own computers. the answer -- down the line, from f...

They honed in on the home computer and obtained a large amount of information. joining now is shane harris, reporter for "wall street journal," shane, great to have you with us. thank you very much for that. >> good to see you. thank you. >> this is -- this is the -- theres been a lot of concern and suspicion about kaspersky related to russian intelligence. this seems to be the first reported incident of a granular instance the products were used by russia to conduct espionage in the u.s. is tha...

Not with offensive. zero contacts with offensive agencies in russian intelligence. >> well, today, he responded to the report about theirv. in an incredibly offensive russian intelligence operation targeting the nsa calling it a false accusation. whatever the role turns out to have been in this, this reporting marks the first known instance, at least the first reported instance of the products being used to conduct high-level espionage against the united states. the journals reporters say today ...

Hackers they might be interested in and hone in on the particular contractor as you noted made the violation of taking classified material home with him from his office at the nsa. >> and, shane, can you tell us from your reporting if kaspersky software was able to identify first of all his computer that there was classified information on his computer, and then, further it could identify which files might be of interest to these spies? >> theres still some key things we dont know about precisel...