Kaspersky Lab has announced it will open a new data center in Switzerland to handle all data for customers in key markets like Europe, North America and Australia in a bid to improve transparency and rebuild trust following a challenging year for the company.
The Russian AV vendor has found itself at the center of a geopolitical storm after its products were banned for US federal government use following reports that Russian intelligence used them to spy on targets.
The UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) recommended the same to government agencies and US retailer Best Buy also announced it was pulling products from its shelves.
CEO Eugene Kaspersky has always maintained his company is innocent of any wrongdoing and never colluded with the Kremlin.
In fact, its Global Transparency Initiative was announced in October last year in response to the allegations. The opening of a new data center in Zurich is the latest stage in this plan, and will apparently see a number of “core processes” moved from Russia.
As well as data on Western customers plus those in Singapore, Japan and South Korea, the facility will host a “software build conveyer” — tools used to assemble ready-to-use software out of source code.
The vendor claimed that before the end of this year it would start to assemble and sign products and AV databases in Zurich before distributing them around the world.
A Transparency Center will also open in the Swiss city later this year, offering stakeholders the opportunity to review the firm’s source code
“In a rapidly changing industry such as ours we have to adapt to the evolving needs of our clients, stakeholders and partners. Transparency is one such need, and that is why we’ve decided to redesign our infrastructure and move our data processing facilities to Switzerland,” said Kaspersky in a statement.
“We believe such action will become a global trend for cybersecurity, and that a policy of trust will catch on across the industry as a key basic requirement.”