Modern snitch: how and why Russians write denunciations of hundreds of their compatriots

Pyotr Sychev, according to him, is a little over 35 years old. In 2005, he emigrated from Russia to Estonia, received Estonian citizenship, and a few years ago moved to Switzerland. From this country, Sychev (he does not say whether this is his real name) sends dozens of denunciations to the Russian police against VKontakte users who, in his opinion, write “extremist” posts or comments. Edition Radio Liberty talked to the modern informer.

Фото: Depositphotos

Several times Sychev even extorted money from his “victims,” but, according to him, he has now stopped contacting them and immediately sent a complaint to the police. Sychev created a channel on Telegram, where he talks in detail about his “work”, with the help of which he wants to “knock out a wedge with a wedge”: the author of the denunciations is a strong opponent of the policies of the Russian authorities, but decided to choose the tactics “the worse the better” for his struggle "

A new type of extortion, fertile ground for which was created by the massive hunt by Russian law enforcement agencies for “extremists” on the Internet, first became known at the end of August. Sychev openly admits that he actually received $300 in bitcoins from two VKontakte users he “caught”, but soon lost interest in blackmail. He considers his struggle ideological and aimed at “encouraging citizens to stop the arbitrariness of the Putin regime.” Recently, as a joke, Sychev sent a description of his channel to the “PEACE Prize” competition organized by Rosmolodezh, the main prize of which is awarded for “the most outstanding deeds in the field of public initiatives, volunteering, charity and other activities for the benefit of society,” and received a nomination. If he wins, he intends to transfer the winnings to help Russian political prisoners, but this is unlikely to save him from the indignation of critics who do not consider the fight against the system through “denunciations” to be in any way ethical.

– How did you come up with the idea of ​​writing denunciations against VKontakte users? Does this word “denunciation” offend you?

– The word “denunciation” does not offend me in any way, because in general I am not one of those citizens who can be offended by some word. The idea came quite a long time ago: from the moment on “Dvacha” (a popular Russian forum system, the main feature of which is the possibility of complete anonymity of users - ed.) there was a separate thread dedicated to the de-anonymization of girls who starred in pornography. It was a couple of years ago when the FindFace application appeared (a service that allows you to find people on VKontakte by photo, closed on July 1, 2018 - ed.). Thus, directly with my participation, we caught several pedophiles in the Chelyabinsk region. I was busy writing with government agencies, and I realized that this system could be used more effectively than looking for pedophiles and helping to cleanse society of them.

Due to the fact that lately the Russian authorities have become, in fact, punitive, I realized that it is best to fight the system, knocking a wedge into a wedge. I decided to write denunciations to an unlimited number of people: I do not define people according to my own political or social preferences. I write denunciations for everyone, regardless of whether this person is a communist, a socialist, a navalist, a putist, a libertarian, a russophobe or a genophobe. For me, all these people are absolutely the same. The main thing is that they live in Russia. Because if they do not live in Russia, then the Russian punitive authorities will not be able to reach them. There will be no point in this.

- How does the writing of denunciations against people, including opposition activists, and the attempt to defeat the system, which is fighting with the same opposition activists, is combined?

- Everything is very simple. The more denunciations, the more people who will be sent to prisons, the more torture there will be, the more background noise will be. And maybe some citizens will understand that a strange time has come when any person, regardless of who he is, may end up in prison. Maybe this will encourage citizens to stop the arbitrariness of power, the arbitrariness of the Putin regime and the arbitrariness of the whole system, and, finally, overthrow this damn power. But if Russians don't care about it, let them go to jail.

– Do you feel sorry for your “victims”?

- Absolutely not. If a person wants to be pityed, let him come to Europe, find a job here, get citizenship. In this way, he will observe all this indecency from afar. But if a person lives in Russia, does nothing, does nothing to overcome this power, then these are his problems.

- What would you suggest people do to overcome this power?

- Leave.

– Are you behind the extortion of money in exchange for a promise not to send screenshots of extremist posts to the police, as described, for example, by VKontakte user Irina Tolmacheva?

- Yes, that's right, it's me. But I realized that this is not very effective. There was some hype, but only for 1–2 days. This needs to be done all the time, but I am not the person who can do this kind of social networking and try to get money out of people for what they have done or allegedly done. I am a slightly different person, so I realized that this was a road to nowhere. It’s better to write denunciations en masse, create your own Telegram account and post all denunciations there.

- Did those whom you blackmailed send you money?

- Yes, two - for 150 dollars in bitcoins.

- You say that you write denunciations absolutely for everyone, for representatives of any ideological position, but at the same time, judging by your channel, you are still attracted primarily by the posts of nationalists, anti-Semites and similar public.

– The fact is that I search using fairly simple keywords: “chocks”, “cut”, “kill”, “kikes”, “Jews” and so on. Therefore, basically, we came across people of the same views. But in fact, there are not only nationalists, not only anti-Semites, there are enough, for example, militant Azerbaijanis who hate Armenians.

“How many complaints have you sent to the police?” And what is their fate? Did it even happen in one case to some real punishment of the authors of these posts?

- To date, 102 applications have been sent - these are directly to the Ministry of the Interior, 8 applications are sent to the FSB. Three or four statements from the Ministry of Internal Affairs were refused, but it was my fault, because I didn’t carefully collect the evidentiary base. People managed to remove all this information. In addition, I notified them. Now I do not notify people. I expect that the authorities will notify them immediately about the initiation of a criminal case. I am still only waiting for the first criminal case on my denunciations: just yesterday, an operative from the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Tula region, from the Center for Countering Extremism, contacted me. He said that the 4 case, which was sent to him, with residents of the Tver region are on examination. As soon as the examination is completed, a decision will be made to initiate a criminal case or to refuse. I am in the 30-day period from the moment the message was sent, waiting for some answer to come to me.

- How do the authors of posts react and react to your actions when you notify them, and now, when you no longer notify them, but perhaps the police will notify them? Do they delete their pages, delete their posts, threaten you?

“Most people immediately turn to insults, saying that this cannot happen to them. “A terrible mistake has occurred, call Comrade Putin.” They, according to them, are not guilty of anything. But at the same time, all posts are deleted instantly. The most important thing is that for the authorities themselves, deleted posts are no longer material for initiating a criminal case. I heard that some old records were restored, that the police turned to the Mail.ru company, which retrieved the archives. But, as my practice shows, directly removed posts have no meaning for Comrade Major, and the matter does not move forward.

- Were not the authors of the posts threatened you, but simply people who learned about your activities? How do your friends and acquaintances react to it?

- Just today there was a case, a friend of one victim contacted me. He promised to find me and punish me. But I do not know how he will come to Europe and how he will punish me. Here the shortbore is allowed, so if anything, I will defend myself. How do friends react? Fine! All my friends mostly adhere to my point of view. They are absolute russophobes. They hate this power. They, by and large, hate the people, which is an absolute statist. Therefore, they support me in my endeavor.

- If the Russian authorities cancel the notorious 282 article and other articles that you use, will you stop writing denunciations?

– Well, Article 282 will not be repealed, because yesterday the State Duma Council adopted a negative response to the bill amending Article 282. Therefore, I hope that nothing will be canceled and everything will continue in the same spirit. Maybe the pace and speed will increase and there will be more and more new victims. The articles that I use are mainly 280 (“Public calls for extremist activities.” – ed.) and 282 (“Inciting hatred or enmity, as well as humiliation of human dignity.” – ed.). There were a couple more articles, for example, 205.2, “Calls for terrorist activities.” I wrote two denunciations regarding this article to the FSB Directorate for the Altai Territory, but have still not received any response. If there is no answer, I will appeal this to the prosecutor's office.

– After a wave of criminal cases for reposts, the management of VKontakte returned the ability to close profiles from prying eyes. Will this interfere with your activities?

- It is absolutely useless. I search all comments via google search. And all these comments are left on public pages, on public platforms, in personal groups. Closing the pages will in no way affect the initiation of criminal proceedings. If there is a person, they will definitely find him.

– Why did you send your application to the pro-Kremlin “PEACE Prize” competition?

- I don’t hope to win, but if I win, I’ll transfer all the money I’ll receive to charity and to help political prisoners in Russia.

- Are you afraid that one day they will report on yourself?

- I will only be glad, but I am afraid that the law enforcement agencies of the European Union will not allow the extradition of their citizen to snowy Nigeria. I am absolutely indifferent to this.

Radio Liberty contacted several VKontakte users on whom Pyotr Sychev wrote denunciations to the police. One of them, a girl who called in a comment to “kill the hacks,” said that no one contacted her about this – neither the police nor the author of the channel “A Monstrous Mistake Happened”:

“I have not received any news from the authorities. Apparently, the person is trying to earn money because he no longer knows how to earn it. My comment was made almost a year ago, and during that time no one bothered me.”

Another social network user, who posted a photo of a smiling Adolf Hitler with the caption “Oooh, that’s so cute,” also said that Sychev had not contacted him. He learned from Radio Liberty that a denunciation had been filed against him to the police.

“Now I will do everything possible to ensure that my page no longer displeases the authorities and will continue to be careful in my statements,” he wrote.

On Thursday, September 13, the State Duma Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption prepared a negative opinion on the draft law excluding criminal liability for reposting on the Internet. A bill to mitigate punishment under the article “Inciting hatred and enmity” was submitted to the State Duma at the end of June. Its authors proposed leaving criminal penalties only for actions involving violence or the threat of violence, abuse of official position, or by an organized group. As the head of the committee, Vasily Piskarev, said, “the idea is legally spelled out incorrectly.” Piskarev referred to the government’s negative review of the bill and the same position of the Supreme Court.

Now in Russia, several criminal cases a day are opened under this article - mainly for posts, reposts and likes on social networks. Barnaul has become one of the “hot spots” on the “extremist map of Russia”: here several local residents are being tried in cases of reposts, the denunciations of which were written by students of the Faculty of Criminal Law of the Altai branch of RANEPA. On Friday, one of the defendants in the Barnaul “cases of extremism,” Anton Angel, was detained and forcibly taken to a psychiatric hospital - like earlier his “colleague” Andrei Shasherin, accused of extremism for publishing memes on the social network VKontakte.

Read also on ForumDaily:

In Russia, the Ministry of Internal Affairs published charges for denunciations

Truth and myths about denigrating in America

Memo to the Americans before traveling to Russia

Do you want more important and interesting news about life in the USA and immigration to America? — support us donate! Also subscribe to our page Facebook. Select the “Priority in display” option and read us first. Also, don't forget to subscribe to our РєР ° РЅР ° Р »РІ Telegram  and Instagram- there is a lot of interesting things there. And join thousands of readers ForumDaily New York — there you will find a lot of interesting and positive information about life in the metropolis.