# Moscow Times: Police Arrest Alleged U.S. Spy Working in Heart of Russian Cybersecurity **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 27, 2017, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321 "2017-01-27T17:23:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2017, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/1 "2017-01-27T17:23:02Z")
> **[Police Arrest Alleged U.S. Spy Working in Heart of Russian Cybersecurity](https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2017/01/26/americas-alleged-spy-in-the-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity-a56945)** > > A top cybersecurity specialist in Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) was arrested on Wednesday reportedly on suspicion of leaking information to the U.S. intelligence community — a bombshell accusation that, if true, would mean Washington... > [@](#): > > A top cybersecurity specialist in Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) was arrested on Wednesday reportedly on suspicion of leaking information to the U.S. intelligence community — a bombshell accusation that, if true, would mean Washington had a spy in the heart of Russia’s national defense infrastructure. > > According to the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, the FSB believes Sergei Mikhailov tipped off U.S. officials to information about Vladimir Fomenko and his server rental company “King Servers,” which the American cybersecurity company ThreatConnect identified last September as “an information nexus” that was used by hackers suspected of working for Russian state security in cyberattacks. I’m wondering if someone in the U.S. outed him. ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2017, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/2 "2017-01-27T17:41:31Z")
I wonder if Russia is going to try to say that all the hacking stuff was planted by the US spy to make them look bad. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2017, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/3 "2017-01-27T17:49:01Z")
[Here’s](https://yro.slashdot.org/story/17/01/25/2035218/russia-arrests-top-kaspersky-lab-security-researcher-on-charges-of-treason) the Slashdot story with links to more about all this. Note that a top person at Kaspersky Labs, a major anti-malware company, is becoming a “non-person” in Putin’s state. The status of Kaspersky’s independence from Putin has been on a lot of people’s minds. It does not look good. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2017, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/4 "2017-01-27T18:01:58Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > [Here’s](https://yro.slashdot.org/story/17/01/25/2035218/russia-arrests-top-kaspersky-lab-security-researcher-on-charges-of-treason) the Slashdot story with links to more about all this. One of the interesting comments posted there was that the arrested people matched the sources in the “Trump likes to get pissed on” memo. Now they’re speculating that the story in the memo was true and Trump leaked information about the sources to Russia as revenge. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2017, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/5 "2017-01-27T18:26:07Z")
Josh Marshall at TPM also speculated that the Trump camp might have outed Mikhailov. No proof yet, of course. But it all does make me go “hmmmm.” [http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/wow-it-gets-bigger](http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/wow-it-gets-bigger) ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2017, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/6 "2017-01-27T21:34:04Z")
> [@Bayard](#): > > Josh Marshall at TPM also speculated that the Trump camp might have outed Mikhailov. No proof yet, of course. But it all does make me go “hmmmm.” Hmmm, indeed. If this is true and the spy was working for the CIA or a similar U.S. agency, that would make Donald Trump guilty of **treason** , and thus eligible for immediate impeachment as well as a possible death penalty. Wouldn’t that be a karmic end to all this recent nonsense? (Of course, considering how prior GOP administrations handled the [criminal outing of deep-cover agents,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair_timeline) it’s really too much to hope for…) ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2017, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/7 "2017-01-28T02:18:18Z")
Here’s Rachel Maddow’s report on this. [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZTpL-GywHk) ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2017, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/8 "2017-01-28T05:42:13Z")
New York Times report: > **[Russians Charged With Treason Worked in Office Linked to Election Hacking...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/world/europe/russia-hacking-us-election.html)** > > The appearance of news on the arrests in four prominent publications suggested that the Kremlin may be prepared to reveal more about the matter. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2017, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moscow-times-police-arrest-alleged-u-s-spy-working-in-heart-of-russian-cybersecurity/778321/9 "2017-01-28T06:04:53Z")
Moscow has a “Times”? Whodathunk?