Security News > 2021 > April > Russian infosec firm Positive Technologies trying to stay positive after US sanctions

Positive Technologies has hit back at the US government's "Groundless accusations" that it helped the Russian state carry out cyber attacks against the West - by highlighting how "Government agencies of different countries" use its products.

Yesterday the US Treasury declared that Positive was selling weaponised infosec tech to the Russian government and ran recruiting events for state hacking agencies, which some Western news outlets have interpreted as meaning the company's flagship Positive Hack Days events.

The MIT Technology Review alleged, citing "Previously unreported US intelligence assessments" it had apparently seen, that Positive "Develops and sells weaponised software exploits to the Russian government." No proof was offered to back up this claim, much like how the US government strenuously insisted that Huawei was a weaponised arm of the Communist Chinese state.

He said: "The impact from all the actions taken by the US government [is] undetermined at this point in time. Although the actions are badly needed by the US and its allies to hopefully counter Russian aggression, many past efforts, sanctions, and plans, have had little impact. Actions by Russian and Chinese state based actors or their proxies have been taking place for many years and efforts in the past to counter them have stuttered, stalled, or just completely failed. A close-knit global effort is required to have an impact on these government actors and entities to stop their IP theft, meddling in elections, and compromising critical infrastructure."

For now, at least, there's still something for Positive to be positive about.

Spokespeople for Sky Mobile have been in touch to say it isn't a customer of Positive Technologies, adding: "Positive were involved in a trial scheme for Sky Mobile before the product launched in 2016, and we haven't worked with them since."

News URL

https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2021/04/16/positive_technologies_us_sanctions_groundless/