Russia’s Kaspersky Lab says it will no longer cooperate on several European cybercrime-fighting initiatives after the European Parliament moved to ban its antivirus software.
"Kaspersky Lab has taken the difficult decision to temporarily halt our numerous collaborative European cybercrime-fighting initiatives, including those with Europol," Europe's police agency, the Moscow-based firm said on June 13.
The United States and a number of European countries have accused Kaspersky of having ties to the Kremlin and Russian intelligence services, allegations Russian officials and Kaspersky deny.
The European Parliament on June 13 issued a report demanding a ban on programs and devices “that have been confirmed as malicious, such as Kaspersky Lab.”
The call by European MPs was not binding, but Kaspersky said that “it demonstrates a distinct lack of respect for the company which has been a firm friend of Europe in the fight against cybercrime."
The chief executive and founder of the software company, Yevgeny Kaspersky, said the company is stopping its work with Europol, on the No More Ransom project, a joint effort by governments and companies to detect ransomware on computers.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security last year ordered the country's agencies using Kaspersky products to remove and replace them with other approved software within 90 days.
Kremlin authorities blamed the decision on political motives and said it was a manifestation of unfair competition practices.
An estimated 400 million computers around the world have Kaspersky Lab's antivirus products installed.
