Security threats Toolkit

Infosecurity conference sees Russian invasion

Dan Ilet ZDNet.co.uk

Published: 28 Apr 2005 17:45 BST

Forty-three Russian security companies were sizing up the competition at the InfoSecurity Europe exhibition this week.

The Russian Information Security Association (ISA), which represents some Moscow-based companies, is looking to compete with some of the American and European companies that were also exhibiting.

"In Russia we are very well known," said Gennady Emelyanov, chairman of the ISA. "There is large growth in the [Russian] market. But we have some issues on international business because we started too late compared to other companies and now the market is saturated."

The ISA represents antivirus company Dr Web, Jet Infosystems, Elvis Plus, Crypto-Pro and 39 other firms all keen to break into the global security market — but not until they get more financial backing.

"Some of our products are fully compatible [with foreign ones] but not many — some cannot compete with others as they are based on old hardware — they have army designs, so we're looking for investment," said Emelyanov.

Emelyanov, a former KGB operative and now a professional cryptographer, said that the problem of hackers, especially those based in Russia, needed to be dealt with by the whole world.

"We consider this a problem, but it's not just a Russian problem, it's an international one. We have hackers who try to steal money abroad — surely we should all fight against that," he said.