Tuesday, July 7, 2020

The Dossier Center: The FSB Price List for Hacking and Surveillance

In its well-researched, critical report on the activities of the FSB, the Dossier Center, an organization funded by the exiled Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, claims to have acquired a price list for the FSB services that violate Russian and international laws.  

Below is my English translation of this part of the report which includes the FSB price list for illegal services.

A Dossier source, who worked for the special service [FSB] (s9), stated that it is a widespread practice for the FSB to provide its services to private individuals on a commercial basis. In the cases like these, there are special price lists which enumerate the services such as, for example, providing information from non-public databases and wiretapping. The source gave the Dossier Center the copy of a price list enumerating some of the [illegal] services provided by the FSB.

General Information:

1.       A dossier of an individual - $100 (includes passport data, Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), Pension Insurance Personal Account Number (SNILS), information on property, vehicles, related individuals, share in legal entities and individual businesses, criminal records, police searches, income, as well as archival data, phone numbers, email addresses);

2.        An expanded dossier of an individual - $500 (includes the information listed in paragraph 1 as well as the information about the movements of this individual by any means of transport, loans, relatives, the numbers of all bank accounts, internal and international passports with photos).

Mobile communications, email, instant messengers:

1.   The printout of an individual’s phone calls indicating geolocation - $1,000–1,500 depending on the mobile service operator;

2.    Hacking an individual’s instant messenger and data upload - from $3,000;

3.     Hacking an individual’s email with ability to access it online - from $1,000 per month of access;

4.     Hacking social media accounts – from $300;

5.     Wiretapping and recording mobile phone conversations - $3,000 per day, seven days minimum;

6.      Determining the location of an individual during the period of 24 hours - from $1,000;

7.      Determining the owner of the phone number, as well as the IMEI number of the device, other phone numbers registered on the same person, the address of the owner of the phone number - from $100;

8.  Information whether an individual’s phone number is already under surveillance - $3,000.

Information from current databases:

A printout from any database of interest (including the databases of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Federal Prison Service, the State Road Traffic Safety Inspectorate, the Federal Tax Service, the Civil Registry Office, the Federal Court Bailiff Service, the Federal Pension Fund, the Federal Registration Service, the Border Guard Service, Russian banks, and Interpol) - from $100.

Financial information:

1.       Every bank account number an individual has in all the banks of the Russian Federation - $100;

2.       The account balance - from $100 per account;

3.       All transaction flows – from $300.

The similar services are also provided for legal entities. According to the source, this practice is common in all FSB units which have access to shared databases. In addition to these services, it is also possible to obtain the external surveillance of a chosen individual. Most often, the FSB Operational Tracking Department is employed for this task.