Software firm Kaspersky Lab has been under scrutiny in the United States for its alleged links with the Russian administration. The company’s founder Eugene Kaspersky recently so far as to offer the software’s source code to the government in order to dispel concerns that its products are used as backdoors by Russian intelligence. That doesn’t seem to have helped, though, as the U.S. government has removed the first from two of its approved vendors lists.
Kaspersky Lab has now been removed from two lists of approved vendors for IT services and digital photographic equipment. A spokeswoman for the U.S. General Services Administration has said that this decision was made after “review and careful consideration.”
This is by far the biggest step taken against the software firm ever since officials in the United States government became suspicious of its links with authorities in Russia.
For its part, Kaspersky Lab maintains that it has “never helped, nor will help, any government in the world with its cyberespionage efforts.”
The offer to turn over the source code was intended to do away with these concerns but it doesn’t appear that the government has taken up Eugene Kaspersky on his offer.
Kaspersky Lab has said in a statement that it hasn’t received updates for any government agency about the change in its vendor status. The statement adds that the company feels it’s “caught in the middle of a geopolitical fight where each side is attempting to use the company as a pawn in their political game.”