>I think its clear Russia uses Kaspersky to make western intelligence look bad. Its more demoralizing to have a AV vendor point this stuff out than one's own security apparatus and its a good cover for the FSB's own hacking. Wired has written about the FSB/Kaspersky connection

This seems like the most relevant part -- it's not that Kaspersky is THAT much better, but that they have a lot of help from the state, which has way more resources than an anti-virus company. How much of that is true, I have no idea.

Also, "free" in the way you use it is a pretty shaky concept: In theory, you're "free" to record police officers acting in the course of their duty, but that doesn't mean the authorities won't ruin your life because of it. (To say nothing of how eerily easy it is for the government to issue gag orders.)