Britain's main cyber security agency on Friday warned British government agencies to avoid using anti-virus software from Russian companies, the latest in a series of moves targeting Moscow-based security software maker Kaspersky Lab.
In a letter to departmental permanent secretaries, the director of the UK National Cyber Security Centre, Ciaran Martin, said Russian-made anti-virus software should not be used in systems containing information that would harm national security if it was accessed by the Russian government.
He said his agency is in talks with Kaspersky Lab to develop a system for reviewing its products for use in Britain.
Kaspersky's anti-virus software was banned from U.S. government networks earlier this year on concerns the company has close ties to intelligence agencies in Moscow and that its software could be used to enable Russian spying.
"We are in discussions with Kaspersky Lab ... about whether we can develop a framework that we and others can independently verify,” Martin said in the letter, which was publicly released.
Kaspersky Lab said in a statement that it looked forward to working with the NCSC on the issue.
Kaspersky has strongly denied allegations about the safety of its products or ties to the Russian government, saying it has become a scapegoat in the midst of rising tensions between Washington and Moscow.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
WASHINGTON - Former U.S. national security adviser Michael Flynn pleaded guilty on Friday to lying to the FBI about Russia, and ABC News said he was prepared to testify that before taking office President Donald Trump had directed him to make contact with Russians.
Reuters could not immediately verify the ABC report, which cited a Flynn confidant. The news sent U.S. stocks sharply lower.
Flynn, a former top Trump campaign aide and a central figure in a federal investigation into Moscow's alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, pleaded guilty under a plea deal on Friday to lying to the FBI.
His decision to cooperate with the investigation led by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, marked a major escalation in a probe that has dogged Trump's administration since the Republican president took office in January.
ABC News cited a confidant as saying Flynn was ready to testify that Trump directed him to make contact with Russians, initially as a way to work together to fight the Islamic State group in Syria.
It was not clear when Trump supposedly told Flynn to contact Russians and whether there would be anything illegal in requesting such contact.
Flynn pleaded guilty to making false statements about contacts he had in December with Russia's ambassador to the United States, Sergei Kislyak, during the transition period after Trump was elected and before he was sworn in. The charges carry a sentence of up to five years in prison.
The White House said Flynn's guilty plea implicated him alone.
"Nothing about the guilty plea or the charge implicates anyone other than Mr. Flynn," Ty Cobb, a White House attorney, said in a statement on Friday.
Flynn was forced out of his White House post in February for misleading Vice President Mike Pence about his conversations with the ambassador.
"The false statements involved mirror the false statements to White House officials which resulted in his resignation in February of this year," Cobb said, adding that the plea "clears the way for a prompt and reasonable conclusion" of Mueller's probe.
Moscow has denied a conclusion by U.S. intelligence agencies that it meddled in the election campaign to try to sway the vote in Trump's favor. Trump has denied any collusion by his campaign and has called Mueller's probe a witch hunt.
Flynn said on Friday his decision to plead guilty and to cooperate with the investigation was "made in the best interests of my family and of our country."
In a statement issued by the law firm representing him, Flynn also said it was "painful to endure" the "false accusations of 'treason' and other outrageous acts" over the past several months but that he recognized "that the actions I acknowledged in court today were wrong."
source: news.abs-cbn.com
Explosive revelations by a top Democratic operative that the 2016 primaries were tipped in Hillary Clinton's favor have convulsed the party as it struggles to rebuild, and whipped up accusations of cheating from President Donald Trump.
Donna Brazile, the Democratic National Committee's interim chairwoman during key months of the presidential campaign, said Clinton's team essentially took over day-to-day operations of the DNC, in essence rigging the system against Senator Bernie Sanders, who was challenging Clinton for the party's nomination.
In a book excerpt published Thursday by Politico, Brazile said her DNC chair predecessor, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, had "let Clinton's headquarters in Brooklyn do as it desired" when it came to controlling party strategy and staffing.
She also said that an agreement reached between the DNC and Clinton's campaign to bring the party out of debt allowed Clinton to "control" party finances, strategy, and the money raised.
"This was not a criminal act, but as I saw it, it compromised the party's integrity," Brazile said.
Political Washington shuddered with the revelations, with members of the Sanders camp crying foul and demanding changes to the DNC framework.
As of Friday, Neither Sanders nor Clinton had responded publicly to Brazile's remarks.
- Rigged -
Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Sanders ally who campaigned with Clinton after she won the nomination, expressed exasperation over what happened.
"This is a real problem," Warren, seen as a potential 2020 presidential candidate, told CNN. "We've got to hold this party accountable."
Asked whether she believes the system was rigged, Warren said "yes."
Trump seized on the crisis Friday, telling reporters that Brazile's book shows that Clinton "bought the DNC and stole the election from Bernie."
He also took the unusual step of suggesting that US justice officials investigate one of his political rivals.
"Everybody is asking why the Justice Department (and FBI) isn't looking into all of the dishonesty going on with Crooked Hillary & the Dems," Trump said at the start of a series of tweets about the scandal.
"Pocahontas just stated that the Democrats, lead by the legendary Crooked Hillary Clinton, rigged the Primaries! Lets go FBI & Justice Dept," he said.
Pocahontas is a nickname -- some call it a slur -- that Trump has repeatedly used to refer to Warren, in reference to her self-proclaimed Native American ancestry.
Minutes later, as he departed for an extended trip to Asia, Trump tweeted from Air Force One that Sanders supporters "have every right to be apoplectic."
"I always felt I would be running and winning against Bernie Sanders, not Crooked H, without cheating, I was right."
Brazile, 57, is a longtime Democratic strategist, having worked on several political campaigns.
She became a Democratic analyst for CNN. Although she was on leave since July 2016 to serve as interim DNC chair, she resigned from the network that October after hacked emails released by WikiLeaks showed that she had shared questions with Clinton's campaign ahead of a debate sponsored by the network.
The new DNC chairman Tom Perez, who served in president Barack Obama's cabinet, did not respond directly to the Brazile allegations.
"We're moving forward," Perez insisted to CNBC.
"One of my goals here as DNC chair is to make sure that the nominating process for 2020 is a process that's totally fair and transparent for everybody," he said, adding that the Democratic primary debate schedule will be set "well in advance" of knowing who the candidates will be.
Sanders had complained last year that the debate schedule was set to favor Clinton, because they were held during off-hours so that fewer people saw Clinton's challengers.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
