Valery Sharifulin / TASS / Scanpix / LETA

An anonymous Telegram channel called “Tovarishch Mayor” (“Comrade Major”) has published a table containing personal information about almost 3,200 people just a day before Moscow’s next election protest. The legal news outlet Mediazona first reported on the leak.

The impromptu database contains information on four Mediazona correspondents and at least two journalists from Meduza. All of them were present at Moscow’s July 27 or August 3 protests for fair elections. Journalists from Radio Svoboda and the independent television channel Dozhd were also affected. Mediazona noted that three of the journalists in the table were stopped by police just before the recent protests and forced to sign an official warning while providing their passport information.

The file also covers some of the protesters themselves, including several (Samariddin Radzhabov, Ivan Podkopayev, Alexey Minyailo, and Danil Beglets) who were charged with rioting following the July 27 march. Opposition candidates who have been barred from running for the Moscow City Duma were also affected by the leak: It was their campaign that sparked the current protest movement. The candidates whose personal information has been leaked include Lyubov Sobol, Ivan Zhdanov, Yulia Galyamina, Dmitry Gudkov, and Vladimir Milov.

The file’s metadata indicates that it was created on July 27 and last edited on August 9. The “Company” field in its properties is listed as “GU MVD of Russia for the city of Moscow” — in other words, the Moscow branch of Russia’s federal police force.

Brief by Mikhail Zelenskiy Translation by Hilah Kohen