Financial secrets of Muscovites made public

People spreading illegal database including information about Russian taxpayers were arrested in Moscow. The data holding commercial, fiscal and bank secrets were supposedly stolen from fiscal control authorities.

The suspects produced tens of thousands of discs; the FSB seized the equipment the criminals employed for large-scale production of discs with databases.

RIA Novosti reports that the operation was conducted at places where the criminal group sold the illegal database, at markets and secret apartments. The FSB operation was a success thanks to long work of intelligence agents and the police aimed to uncover illegal spreading of database holding information about incomes of individuals.

Last Friday, the RF Prosecutor’s General Office charged the Interior Ministry with inspecting markets selling discs and finding out if they spread illegal database holding information about taxpayers.

A spokesperson for the Prosecutor’s General Office said the inspection was initiated because “mass media reported that fiscal secrets of many taxpayers were made public”. He added that the Prosecutor’s General Office charged the Interior Ministry with investigation of the case and opening a criminal case on the Criminal Code clause “Illegal obtaining and disclosure of data holding commercial, fiscal or bank secret”.

Mass media report that the Fiscal Inspection-2004 database contains information about incomes of individuals in Moscow and the Moscow Region, over 9 million of reports about people’s incomes including information about their employments and home addresses. Earlier, similar illegal databases came out containing fiscal reports over 2002 and 2003. I.L.