After China, Russia may ban some Apple products, fearing espionage

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org
Parliamentarians in Russia are preparing a bill that would prevent lawmakers from using several Apple products, including iPhones and iPads, due to fears that they are susceptible to penetration by foreign intelligence agencies. A group of lawmakers in the State Duma, the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia, have drafted the bill, which argues that State Duma deputies with access to confidential or classified government information should be banned from using iPhones and iPads, among other Apple products. One deputy, Dmitry Gorovtsov, from the center-left Just Russia party, said parliamentarians should simply “switch to simple mobile phones”, preferably produced by Russian manufacturers, and should use them “only for phone calls”. Last month, the Russian Ministry of Defense stepped in to deny media reports that it was about to ban Apple products. The denial came in response to a leading article in mass circulation daily Izvestia, which cited an unnamed Defense Ministry employee as saying that the Russian armed forces were about to ban the use of iPhones by all servicemen. The article claimed the move was designed to stop “information leaks”. But a Russian Ministry of Defense spokesman, Major General Igor Konashenkov, told a press conference that the Russian armed forces had no plans to ban “the mobile devices of a certain manufacturer”. The news from Russia comes a just months after authorities in China announced the removal of some Apple products from a government procurement list, reportedly because of fears that they were susceptible to electronic espionage by the United States. As intelNews reported at the time, nearly a dozen Apple products were removed from the Chinese government list; they included the iPad and iPad Mini, as well as MacBook Air and MacBook Pro products —though interestingly the inventory of removed items did not include Apple smartphone products. The Russian State Duma initiative to ban some Apple products has already been approved by a security-related committee and has now been forwarded to the Duma Council. The latter will consider the bill for approval, before sending it to a plenary session on the floor of the Duma for discussion. The process is expected to take up to two weeks.