Kaspersky Lab Faked Malware To Harm Rivals

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As much as I want to claim to be surprised by these allegations, I honestly can't. Are you surprised?

Beginning more than a decade ago, one of the largest security companies in the world, Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab, tried to damage rivals in the marketplace by tricking their antivirus software programs into classifying benign files as malicious, according to two former employees.
 
What is a sure way to make sure that your company's security program has a market?

That's right, make viruses/malware and distribute them.
 
What is a sure way to make sure that your company's security program has a market?

That's right, make viruses/malware and distribute them.

They weren't making viruses, they were tricking competitors into deleting end user's files.
 
They weren't making viruses, they were tricking competitors into deleting end user's files.

In effect turning competitors' products into a viruses.

They were modifying files, submitting them as suspicious, and then using their competitors programs to render the users' computers broken or unusable.
 
Is Kaspersky stuff good to use?

After these allegations? No.

And even though I am not usually the conspiracy theories type, I would carefully consider acquiring any software from Russian corporations these days. I have no beef with Russia, but nobody knows what businesses are coerced to do under the current regime Russians live under.
 
Not sure why Kaspersky felt the need to do something like this. They were already at the top, if not already the industry leader.
 
The article sort of explains the why: Kaspersky felt that they're doing a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of discovering malicious files which others are profiting on. To test that theory they submitted those false positives. Not saying that's the right thing to do, just paraphrasing the article.

the soaring number of harmful computer programs have prompted security companies to share more information with each other, industry experts said. They licensed each other's virus-detection engines, swapped samples of malware, and sent suspicious files to third-party aggregators such as Google Inc's (GOOGL.O) VirusTotal.

By sharing all this data, security companies could more quickly identify new viruses and other malicious content. But the collaboration also allowed companies to borrow heavily from each other's work instead of finding bad files on their own.

Kaspersky Lab in 2010 complained openly about copycats, calling for greater respect for intellectual property as data-sharing became more prevalent.

In an effort to prove that other companies were ripping off its work, Kaspersky said it ran an experiment: It created 10 harmless files and told VirusTotal that it regarded them as malicious.
 
I remember a time when Kaspersky was catching a majority of the major malware players, where the competitors *cough*Norton*cough* couldn't catch a cold. I don't blame for trying to sabotage the competition when they were essentially 90% of the solution but losing out due to smaller advertising budgets. Either way they shouldn't of done this, their competition was already imploding due to the sheer bloat and this only goes to hurt their image.
 
Probably the best online "security" company is willing to give it all up for a little more.

I'm not surprised.

They still make the best stuff, but this kind of sleazy business is too common in tech these days.
 
"Moscow based"

I'm SHOCKED! Can't wait for the mob tie-in.

Assuming the allegations are proven true that is....
 
In an effort to prove that other companies were ripping off its work, Kaspersky said it ran an experiment: It created 10 harmless files and told VirusTotal that it regarded them as malicious. VirusTotal aggregates information on suspicious files and shares them with security companies.

Within a week and a half, all 10 files were declared dangerous by as many as 14 security companies that had blindly followed Kaspersky's lead, according to a media presentation given by senior Kaspersky analyst Magnus Kalkuhl in Moscow in January 2010.

When Kaspersky's complaints did not lead to significant change, the former employees said, it stepped up the sabotage.

This is so face palming stupid. WTF did they expect?

"Hey, those guys over there are thieves!"

"Hey! Why did you call the cops on those guys?"
 
It's not like the other anti virus companies haven't shot themselves in the foot a time or two. A couple of years ago sophos marked anything with the word 'updater' as a virus, including their own updater!

Took me two days to get a plan of action together to roll out to 1200 workstations.
 
Just two days ago someone in another thread was claiming AV companies don't do things like this even though they have been suspected of doing so in the past. Too many software industry apologists on this forum trying to make us think we are tin foil hat wearers when we are not.
 
Everyone's flipping out over a Russian company being accused of doing something stupid, but they're 100% okay with that McAfee guy making drugs and having a relationship with a 15 year old. I guess the difference is that narcotics and being a pedobear is macho and cool but being a Russian isn't because we never managed to put the Cold War thing-y behind us.
 
Everyone's flipping out over a Russian company being accused of doing something stupid, but they're 100% okay with that McAfee guy making drugs and having a relationship with a 15 year old. I guess the difference is that narcotics and being a pedobear is macho and cool but being a Russian isn't because we never managed to put the Cold War thing-y behind us.
What are you talking about? People haven't been "okay" with McAfee in over a decade, he and his company just didn't happen to be the topic of this thread.

You also seem to be implying it's only the US that hasn't left the cold war mindset behind. Have you watched any Putin address, ever? Russia invaded a sovereign (former soviet bloc) country, and shot down a passenger jet just last year...

I expect better of you CUG, this is twitter-level trolling. Step it up.
 
I expect better of you CUG, this is twitter-level trolling. Step it up.

And yet, if you were a fishy, you would have just nomsed on the bait? (Assuming that was trolling which it wasn't and you only labeled it as such because it disagrees with your idea. But that's okay because people do that here as no one really knows what trolling is anymore. :D)
 
Everyone's flipping out over a Russian company being accused of doing something stupid, but they're 100% okay with that McAfee guy making drugs and having a relationship with a 15 year old. I guess the difference is that narcotics and being a pedobear is macho and cool but being a Russian isn't because we never managed to put the Cold War thing-y behind us.

The girl was 17 and not 15. You just called him a pedo when he is not. You could be sued for that.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ted-Belize-police-claim-running-meth-lab.html

"Belize security claim he had illegal weapons and drugs and that he was arrested with 17-year-old girl"

Also, McAfee AV is owned by Intel and not him.
 
The girl was 17 and not 15. You just called him a pedo when he is not. You could be sued for that.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ted-Belize-police-claim-running-meth-lab.html

"Belize security claim he had illegal weapons and drugs and that he was arrested with 17-year-old girl"

Also, McAfee AV is owned by Intel and not him.

Ah hah, I get it. That makes it all okay to do because he was only caught with his underage girlfriend when she turned 17. Nevermid the details before that specific incident or the fact that he's like 80 years old and can't pick out someone who's at least an adult. Yup, its all okay. :rolleyes:
 
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