Is JetBrains Russian? Is it safe to use?

JetBrains is not offically russian company (but founded by russian citizens). They have headquaters and are registered in Czech Republic, so company is in european legislation area. They have R&D centers around a world but mostly in Russia. The reason why they are registered in CZ are that they do not trust russian goverment and businness in Russia. I don't think that it's security risk to use JetBrains products, but I expect that delivering new versions and support will be postponed or cancelled for some time.

https://twitter.com/jetbrains/status/1496786254494670851?s=1...

They made a statement. Not sure it removes all risk from their software, but I’m using it right now.

Reading this post all I can think of is Dr. Strangelove and what danger I might be in having played many hours of tetris.

We should be discouraging alarmism, especially given the political situation.

Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and many other US companies spy on us and let US government do the same using their software.

Suddenly, because US/EU sh#t foreign policy that led to this Russia /Ukraine war, Jetbrains became a problem?

What kind of brain washing is this?

I need to stop using HN until this whole conflict ends, reading these posts is killing my brain cells at an unprecedented rate.

So being Russian is bad now? I don't think that is safe to assume that.

> In the light of recent development is it safe to assume that JetBrain products are not use for Russian espionage?

If you don't trust the software you are using, just don't use closed source software, use only free, open and libre software or compile it yourself. Since all closed source software is essentially 'malware'.

That is safe to assume.

This is extraordinary and irresponsible FUD

The OP's post is flagged for asking if JetBrains products are safe to use considering the current Russian Military attack against the Ukraine. Interesting.

This post, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30459985#30461340, praising JetBrains, is not flagged. Also, interesting.

Is Android Studio safe from Russian spyware? Is Android Studio's safety assured by Google?

It is said that dictatorships like Russia and China will use any of their very large corporations that provides services to foreigners to help them reach their own goals. This is logical and probably true.

Kasppersky is (was?) the world's most widely deployed anti virus. It was founded by a former KGB officer and is closely tied to the Russian government.

It was found to be uploading files to Russia when their algo figured it was good docs for the Russians to have.

JB is probably in the same boat. (So is Zoom and lots of other software, but that's for another day)

If you are writing software for the Ukrainian army, don't use JetBrains. If you are a small time dev in the U.S. it is likely within your risk profile.

If you just want to punish Putin, and therefore you would stop using Russian software, that's another story, and one that I have a harder time justifying.

I think that for any JB product you can find better and free alternatives.

> is it safe to assume that JetBrain products are not use for Russian espionage?

A citizen of country X should never assume that intelligence agencies of country Y are not spying on them or their communications through any and all available means.

The statement applies even when Y = X.

Being russian is not a crime yet. The possibility of compromising the russian office is not zero, but it would mean that all internal checks has failed in the Check HQ as well. Again not zero, but I'd be against ruining a good company due to suspecian only.