Russian Cyber Security Chief Claims Russian Hackers Got Immunity in Exchange for Stolen Information
On Wednesday, Russian independent TV channel Dozhd published a letter by the head of infamous Kaspersky Lab accusing the Russian government of recruiting hackers for secret tasks in return for criminal immunity.
Ruslan Stoyanov, the former head of cyber-crime investigations at Kaspersky Labs, was recently arrested by Russian authorities on treason charges. In the letter he addressed to the Russian authorities, Stoyanov revealed how the government recruits cyber hackers for special “government tasks”.
Kaspersky lab is a Moscow based security software maker (Russian version of Mcaffee security), which reportedly has close ties to the Russian government. Bloomberg reports that some senior Kaspersky staff have regular “banya nights” with government officials and that Kaspersky staff secretly provided technical support to the state security services (FSB) and other Russian agencies.
Stoyanov’s letter claims that the Russian government has committed to special deals with cyber hackers whereby the authorities close their eyes to any criminal cyber activities in exchange for special work the hackers do for the government. According to Stoyanov’s letter the government also appeals to “patriotic” sentiment in order to recruit these hackers.
“The essence of the deal is that the state gets access to the technologies and information of ‘cyberthieves,’ in exchange for allowing them to steal abroad with impunity,” Stoyanov said.
In the letter he warned about such collaboration, claiming that it will lead to a new crime wave.
The worst-case scenario, according to Stoyanov, is to give those hackers imunity and allow them to steal money abroad in exchange for hacked information. If this continues there will be a whole new group of “patriot thieves” who will be violating the law without any fear of punishment.
He claims that his arrest was a set up because he threatened the government’s and cyber thieves’ interests.
“I was thrown in jail and accused of treason. No one talks about this so that my case doesn’t threaten reputation of the generals and business interests of cyber thieves.”
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