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Russia – Holland 2009

On 19 June 2009 a bi-lingual, colour supplement to The Moscow Times will be published. The “Russia-Holland” supplement is an annual business publication, devoted to the partnership between Russian and Dutch companies.

This year the magazine is timed to coincide with the most glorious event in the cultural co-operation between the two countries for the last decade – the opening of Hermitage Amsterdam. The unique exhibition centre will be opened on the 19 June by Her Majesty Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands and the President of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev.



Monday, July 06, 2009 Updated at 06 July 2009 20:11 Moscow Time.

The Moscow Times » Issue 2206 » Technology

Police Arrest Pensioner for Running Hacker Gang

25 May 2001The Associated PressPolice on Thursday announced the arrest of a gang of hackers led by a 63-year-old retired man, who they said was bitter about his small pension and the lack of royalties for his legal programming work.

The group of about five people, whom police did not identify, worked from Internet cafes in Moscow to steal about 300 numbers from credit cards belonging to clients in Western countries, said Dmitry Chepchugov, chief of the Moscow city police department in charge of computer-related crime.

They then used the cards to make false purchases from an online company they had created, which sold useless information about the location of stands of timber in Russia, Chepchugov told a news conference.

He did not say when the group was arrested.

"This case dispels the myth that hackers are 14- and 15-year-old geniuses. These were professionals without any romantic ideas who wanted to make money," Chepchugov said, adding that they face three to 10 years in prison if convicted, he said.

Chepchugov declined to say how police learned about the scheme, but said his department cooperated with the Russian company Cyberplat, which handles credit-card transactions on the Internet.

He said the card numbers were stolen from web sites that sell products online.

The retired man formerly worked at a Moscow institute where he wrote programming code that was then widely used, but had no legal rights to royalties, Chepchugov said.

"One can understand him, considering the realities of life today," he said.

The average Russian pension is about 1,013 rubles ($37) per month, and many pensioners take menial jobs to supplement the meager income.

Moscow police estimate electronic fraud in Moscow, including schemes to cheat mobile telephone operators, costs businesses about $12 million to $15 million a month.