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Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: Ben on October 07, 2017, 12:51:30 PM

Title: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: Ben on October 07, 2017, 12:51:30 PM
I'm really interested on Rev's take on this. I use Kaspersky because it has always had very strong protection without being either annoying or a resource hog.

It appears there is still speculation at this point, but if the speculation turns out to be accurate, it's a bit concerning.  If true, I may end up switching to paid versions of Avast/AVG (I guess they are one in the same now).

https://amp.businessinsider.com/russian-hackers-nsa-kaspersky-lab-software-2017-10
Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: TechMan on October 07, 2017, 06:34:05 PM
Ben, try Eset.
Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: Perd Hapley on October 07, 2017, 07:05:40 PM
They should ask Hillary for help.

https://twitchy.com/dougp-3137/2017/10/07/beyond-parody-hillary-clintons-offering-pointers-about-what/
Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: lee n. field on October 08, 2017, 02:39:18 PM
My son just posted this on his Book of Faces:  Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet (https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2011/10/exclusive-computer-virus-hits-drone-fleet/).

(Minor Kaspersky tie-in.)

Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: RoadKingLarry on October 08, 2017, 08:05:38 PM
My son just posted this on his Book of Faces:  Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet (https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2011/10/exclusive-computer-virus-hits-drone-fleet/).



Why the hell do drone "pilots" wear flight suits?
Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: Scout26 on October 08, 2017, 08:06:49 PM
Why the hell do drone "pilots" wear flight suits?


For picking up women in the O-Club....Duh....
Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: RevDisk on October 08, 2017, 08:57:15 PM
*shrug*

So far, no one has offered any evidence of anything. Pretty much on par with "Russians hax0red the elections" meaning they bought some ads and had paid trolls sling excrement. My best guess is Kaspersky didn't play ball on US state malware. This fits history. Stuxnet, Duqu, Flame, Gauss, Regin and the Equation Group. Other AV companies tried to softball it to the extent possible. Kaspersky didn't. Back in 2015, they found nation-state level malware on their internal network.

My personal take, and it is strictly opinion worth exactly what you paid for it, NSA is tired of spending a lot of time and effort on writing malware to have it added to updates and treated like any other virus. Direct pressure didn't work. Trying to hit Kaspersky's pocketbook might.

If Eugene Kaspersky leaves the company or dies, yeah, I'd stop using their software. Sadly, there's not many other top tier antiviruses out there. F-Secure is the only other one. It's less user friendly than even Kaspersky is. The rest are mid tier (Sophos, Symantec, Trend Micro) or bottom tier garage (ESET, AVG, etc).

Problem is, if you take out the top tier protection and leave the world's infrastructure protection in the hands of the mediocre, it's a real world thousand times worse off than even the random successful terrorism or rogue nation. NSA doesn't think like that. Better to burn dozens of bridges than get blamed for the next... whatever.

https://www.wired.com/2015/06/kaspersky-finds-new-nation-state-attack-network/

If Kaspersky was a hostile entity, why give exploit information to Microsoft who will release a patch and close that loophole out for the entire world? Why not share them strictly with the FSB or other Russian agencies? Why openly PUBLISH attack vectors instead of profiting off it? If they're an arm of the Russian cyberwarfare complex, they're doing a remarkably bad job at it by notifying vendors of exploits and publishing methods used by nationstate level malware.
Title: Re: Kaspersky Antivirus May Have Been Used for Hacking
Post by: T.O.M. on October 08, 2017, 10:29:53 PM
For picking up women in the O-Club....Duh....

Spewed ice water on that one, no kidding.  I was thinking just that thing.