“Initially, when starting this project, Shaltay-Boltay was supposed to be a spokesman for the Anonymous International. Mainly, I was doing this job. Then, Anikeev started introducing himself to the reporters as Lewis and got everyone confused.” Crime Russia

Alexander Glazastikov is ‘Shaltay Boltay’. Glazastikov is on the run and hopes to be granted political asylum in Estonia. In the last few days, Glazastikov agreed to an interview with Fontanka and met with the crew of Dozhd TV-channel and Ksenia Sobchak. Glazastikov provided a lot of information about the inner working of Anonymous International / Shaltay Boltay. However, the link between the “hackers group” and the FSB remains mysterious. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today

Between October and December 2016, the Federal Security Service (FSB) has arrested Anonymous International/Shaltay-Boltay leader Vladimir Anikeev as well as two of his alleged accomplices Aleksandr Filinov and Konstantin Tepljakov. Vladimir Anikeev’s girlfriend Irina Shevchenko is on the “wanted list”. The FSB has also arrested Ruslan Stoyanov, the former head of Kaspersky Lab’s Computer Incident Investigation Department. Last but not least, the FSB has arrested colonel Sergey Mikhailov and his colleague Major Dmitry Dokuchaev, both senior officers of the 2nd Operational Management of FSB Information Security Center.

BREAKING NEWS: The deputy Director of the FSB Information Security Center — Department of Information Technology (DIT) — Dmitry Pravikov is currently under investigation. Zhahongir Yuldashev was appointed as temporarily chief in charge of operations instead of Mikhailov, and Alexey Grachev was appointed as the Interim Head of the DIT to replace Dmitry Praviko . There is obviously a major crisis but the reasons remain unknown. Stay tuned.

WARNING — The arrest of the high-ranking officers of the Federal Security Service – Sergey Mikhaylov and Dmitry Dokuchayev may or may not be connected with the case of the Shaltay Boltay hack group. Also, it is not known at this point whether or not, this story is related to the “hack” of the 2016 US Presidential election.

Indeed on February 5 2017, Russian media reported that Anikeev has pleaded guilty to unauthorized access to computer information. According to Anikeev’s lawyer Ruslan Koblev:

Anikeev confirmed he is the hacker known as ‘Lewis’ Anikeev now denies knowing FSB high-ranking officers Colonel Sergey Mikhailov and Major Dmitry Dokuchaev. [This is a bit strange for it has been assumed so far that Anikeev had pointed Mikhailov to the investigators after his arrest in October 2016. But, even if this information is true, it does not rule out the possibility that Mikhailov was ‘using’ Anikeev since he acknowledged that he did not always know who he was working for.] Anikeev is charged only with part 3 of Article 272 (Illegal Access to Computer Information). Anikeev claims that the arrests of the FSB officers and Kaspersky Lab employee — charged with treason — have nothing to do with his case.

This series will focus on the profiles of the — known — individuals wanted or arrested so far, as well as those who may be arrested in the near future. Their suspected crimes and the global timeline of this affair will also be detailed in two other posts. These posts will be updated whenever additional information is made available.

Profile of Alexander Glazastikov

Alexander Glazastikov is a computer scientist from St. Petersburg. He joined Shaltay Boltay for several reasons: the boredom of his day job, the appeal of exposing the ‘crimes and incompetence’ of Russian elites as well as the prospect of making some money.

The group was initiated by Anikeev, Teplyakov and himself. [interestingly, Glazastikov says that he never heard of Filinov who denies all charges against him.] The three men met on a website called Damochka.ru. They created Shaltay Boltay in mid 2013.

Anikeev is hardly a hacker. In fact, he needs help to install any software on his computer. However, Anikeev had “sources” of very valuable information. Although Teplyakov is a programmer, his job was mostly to go through the files and sort out important information that could be used for blackmail. Glazastikov ridiculed the idea that Anikeev’ girlfriend was spying on wealthy businessmen using a “fake Wi-Fi” connection. The group never had such capacity.

ARREST — NO. Currently living in Estonia where he asked political asylum. After his arrest, Anikeev — or someone pretending to be him — attempted to lure both Glazastikov and Teplyakov to Russia. Teplyakov accepted but Glazastikov refused, having guessed correctly that something was seriously wrong.

LEGAL CHARGE –NOT KNOWN but Alexander Glazastikov is most likely charged under part 3 of Art. 272 of the Criminal Code (Illegal Access to Computer Information) with the maximum prison sentence of five years.

CRIMES — The Anonymous International published a lot of information from the correspondence of officials and businessmen between 2014 and 2016. also obtained the correspondence of the presidential assistant Vladislav Surkov.

“The group crossed a red line for Russian officials in 2015, when it posted letters and documents from the chief of the Defense Ministry’s construction department and then followed up with an open letter to the head of military counterintelligence mocking the agency’s inability to keep secrets.” “Unidentified people bought the documents stolen from the military construction department chief for about US $100,000.”

LINK TO FSB — Alexander Glazastikov says that — in mid 2016 — Anikeev told him that the FSB wanted to control the group.

Glazastikov said Anikeyev didn’t name the FSB officers he was dealing with, and added that he doesn’t know if they were the officers of the FSB’s cybercrime division arrested on treason charges in December.

HACKING of DNC — Glazastikov claims that the group has no involvement whatsoever.

VIDEO

REFERENCES

https://twitter.com/b0ltai

https://b0ltai.org/

Man involved in Shaltay-Boltay case was after Lurk hacker group — Crime RUSSIA 08/02/2017

The only member of Shaltay-Boltay left on the loose reveals details on their work — Crime Russia

Russian hackers get burned in deal with Russia’s spy agency