Almost three weeks after the start of the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) issued a warning . This recommended “replacing applications from Kaspersky’s antivirus software portfolio with alternative products.”
The Russian IT company issued a statement about this warning on the same day, in which it sees the arguments for this warning as being more politically based:
“We believe that this decision is not based on the technical assessment of Kaspersky products – which we have consistently advocated for at the BSI and across Europe – but rather was made for political reasons.”
Kaspersky blog, March 15, 2022
Kaspersky further notes that it is “a privately held global cybersecurity company and, as a private company, has no ties to the Russian or any other government.”
Kaspersky values transparency and launched the Global Transparency Initiative (GTI) . Part of the data infrastructure was relocated to Switzerland, and since November 2018, data from European users has been stored and processed in these same data centers. The company also provides access to documentation and source codes for the best-known products for private users and companies.
Kaspersky sought support from the BSI
At the beginning of March, Kaspersky contacted the BSI by email. Customers of the IT company were probably unsettled because “there are no statements from the BSI on Kaspersky security” after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. With the support of the BSI, the Russian company would like to inform its customers about the safety of its products.
This request was followed by a lot of email traffic within the BSI, which Bayerischer Rundfunk received through a request under the Freedom of Information Act. Also included here are around 370 pages of documents on how the BSI's decision came about. Bayerischer Rundfunk has now analyzed this together with “Spiegel” .
The path to the decision
The documents show that the decision-making process was not an easy one. The starting signal for this was a short internal email from BSI President Arne Schönbohm, in which he wrote (sic!): “Unfortunately I don’t think I’ll reply at all”.
On March 2nd, “dealing with Kaspersky” was to be discussed at a meeting at the BSI, which was also attended by the BSI President and BSI Vice President. As can be seen from the protocol, “any findings/technical reasons” should be collected that can be used to justify a warning about the IT company's products.
Since Kaspersky's anti-virus software is used in many German companies, including those responsible for securing critical infrastructure, there are fears that spies could hack the software to spy on companies, institutions or administrative apparatus.
There was also the fear that Russia could view Germany as an enemy because of the sanctions it had imposed. There is “imminent danger” because it is “not certain that Kaspersky still has complete control over its software and IT systems or that it will not lose them in the near future.” Since Kaspersky itself has no way of “positively influencing the risk assessment through technical or other measures,” a warning must be issued.
BSI includes BMI in decision-making
The BSI reports to the Ministry of the Interior, but can usually make such decisions itself. However, when it comes to strategic positioning, “the BMI should generally be included”. In this case, however, the BSI included the BMI in the decision-making process, as “it is common practice for the highest federal authorities to be involved in the decision-making process in cases of high political importance (…).”
A first draft is not signed by some in the BSI, citing Kaspersky's security precautions in recent years.
Arno Schönbohm also does not agree with this version and it should be reworded. The revised version deals with the criticisms raised, but it is now explained that Kaspersky has various connections to Russia, the company headquarters is in Moscow, the owners are Russian citizens, and many employees have their families in Russia.
Therefore, it is concluded that one is “exposed to the direct influence and pressure of the authorities”. The BSI emphasizes here that one should not wait until Kaspersky's software is misused, but should act preventatively.
Finally, the BMI comes into play. The head of the cybersecurity department complains that all arguments refer too much to the past, which is why a paragraph is added: “We now assume that the Russian government would no longer take Kaspersky's international business and reputation into account. “
Because of the war, all assumptions that the BSI had previously made regarding Kaspersky are no longer valid.
Information to Kaspersky
The warning and its contents were therefore coordinated and released for publication. Kaspersky will be informed about this by the BSI on March 14th. A three-hour period is given for the IT company to respond, but this did not happen.
Worked “clearly in terms of the result”.
Dennis-Kenji Kipker, professor of IT security law in Bremen, analyzed the procedure as documented in the documents. In his opinion, the BSI worked “clearly in terms of results”. The fact that a warning should be issued was apparently already decided before the appropriate arguments were sought.
The BSI acts in accordance with the BSI Act , which states in Section 1 that it “carries out tasks for the federal ministries on the basis of scientific and technical findings”. Kipker criticizes here that the working method emerging from the documents shows exactly the opposite.
In a guest article on Legal Tribune Online, Kipker asks the critical question of whether the BSI is objective enough to make such decisions.
After the warning was published by the BSI, Kaspersky tried to take action against it - without success.
In response to a request, the BSI stated that the assessment of a risk situation was confirmed based on “previous court decisions”.
The BMI has not yet responded to a request.
Source: BSI , Kaspersky - Statement , Kaspersky - Global Transparency Initiative , Bayerischer Rundfunk , Spiegel , Legal Tribune Online , Tagesschau
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