INTEL READS: How Russian Spies Recruit, Pressure and Run Their Informants (via POLITICO.EU)
INTEL READS | Ujasusi Blog Originals
Just before New Year’s Eve 2024, as many Russians were calling family and friends with holiday wishes, a 21-year-old computer science student living in Moscow received a very different kind of greeting.
“Fate keeps steering you away, from criminal persecution, from the army. I hope everything works out for you,” the caller said. The well-wishes then took a darker turn: “Don’t forget your homeland. And share more information.”
The student — who we have agreed to call Ivan because of fears for his safety — felt intimidated, but not surprised.
Throughout the previous year he’d been harassed by the same man and his colleague, both Russian intelligence officers. It had begun 16 months earlier, after Ivan had been detained by them and offered a deal: Inform on his acquaintances in anti-Kremlin circles, many of whom had fled abroad, or go to prison.
The New Year’s call is part of a cache of text messages and recorded conversations between Ivan and his handlers that were shared with POLITICO.
At a time when the Kremlin is waging a widening campaign of sabotage and espionage across Europe, they offer rare documentary insight into how Russian intelligence agencies recruit, coerce and manage informants.
As this long-standing practice extends beyond Russia’s borders, it poses new challenges for European host countries and their intelligence agencies.
The conversations — which took place between the summers of 2023 and 2025 — reveal a “good cop, bad cop” routine to pressure Ivan to infiltrate the online communication of an opposition group and report on their activities in Europe from Moscow.
The men were hungry for seemingly trivial details, and their interest wasn’t limited to Russian citizens. They also wanted specifics about those — Russian or otherwise — helping emigrés in Europe, whether they be language teachers or foreign ministry officials in the countries where the dissidents had found new homes.
“Find out who is in Europe and in which country, and who is helping them, incl. specialist organizations,” reads one message.
When Ivan told one of the handlers about a rally in Berlin in November 2024 protesting Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the agent pushed for more: “I’m telling you, describe it, describe it, send me a report,” he wrote. “Don’t make me chase you.”
“We know everything already, but we’d like to know more,” another message reads.
‘Disposable assets’
Since Moscow’s all-out attack on Ukraine, hundreds of thousands of Russians have left the country, among them some of the Kremlin’s most vocal critics.
In Europe they hoped to find safety. Instead they have become both the targets of, and desired assets for, the Russian security services.
While much attention has focused on “disposable agents” recruited online for acts of sabotage or vandalism, the conversations shared by Ivan point to a different tactic: the long-term cultivation of informants embedded within opposition circles themselves.
“We need to be prepared to live with this for a long time to come,” said Andrei Soldatov, a leading expert on Russian intelligence.
Last year, in the first known espionage case against a Russian political dissident in Europe since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Poland put Igor Rogov — an exiled opposition activist-turned-student — on trial in the southern city of Sosnowiec.
Authorities accused Rogov of being connected to a bomb plot and of spying on fellow Russian exiles as well as the Polish government officials and university staff, including language teachers, who were helping them settle into a new life.
According to the indictment, Rogov was recruited in Russia by the federal security service (FSB) several years before his departure, and continued his role as an informant in exile. Rogov’s lawyer declined to comment on the case but court documents seen by POLITICO say he admitted to working for the FSB.
For the Russian security services, building networks of informants inside exile circles has a dual purpose, Soldatov said.
As long as informants remain unexposed, they can provide Moscow with information on the whereabouts, personal lives and vulnerabilities of the Kremlin’s critics at a time when it has diminished access to them because of the expulsion of dozens of Russian spies. And if an informant gets caught, as in Rogov’s case, it fosters distrust — both within activist circles and between them and their host countries.
“Either way, it’s a win-win,” Soldatov said.
While Moscow publicly dismisses exiled opposition figures as marginal and irrelevant, the attention it pays to them betrays a deep insecurity. In addition to infiltration efforts, Russian authorities continue to open criminal proceedings against Kremlin critics, even in absentia, labeling them “extremists” or “terrorists.”
The logic of the security services, Soldatov explained, is that while today’s exiles may appear unimportant, so did Vladimir Lenin before the 1917 revolutions that brought down the then-czar and more than 300 years of Romanov rule.
“From the FSB’s perspective, they can’t afford even a 1-percent chance that these people could one day undermine Russia’s political stability” or threaten Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hold on power, Soldatov said.
‘Don’t try to play me for a fool’
Ivan’s troubles started in the summer of 2023. He’d just walked out of the jet bridge after landing at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport — back from visiting his parents in a Russian city that’s а two-and-a-half-hour flight away — when he was approached by two men in civilian clothes and two uniformed police officers who confiscated his phone and his passport.
The two men in civilian clothes introduced themselves as investigators for especially important cases, an elite FSB department tasked with state crimes. They flashed their badges at him, too quickly to see, and walked him to the baggage carousel.
As they waited with Ivan for his bags, they began casually pressing him about his personal life, his student debts and his parents — “things that they could only have found out from monitoring my communication,” Ivan recalled. “They were looking for pressure points.”
Afterward, in a room used by airport police, the conversation took a more serious turn. The two men confronted him with an organizational chart with his name and photograph and those of several acquaintances, accusing him — accurately — of having belonged to the youth group Vesna.
Тhe pro-democracy group had initially made a name for itself with satirical, mediagenic protests. In 2017 they held a “funeral for Russia’s future” ahead of a presidential election that gave Putin yet another term. А year later they hung a banner from a bridge in St. Petersburg reading “This World Cup is filled with blood,” ahead of the finals of the football tournament that Russia was hosting.
Following Moscow’s full-scale assault on Ukraine, Vesna had grown into one of the country’s main opposition forces, helping coordinate and encourage anti-war and anti-Kremlin protests.
The two agents also showed Ivan another document that appeared to include highlighted excerpts from a Vesna chat on Telegram, which had been deleted after a Russian court labeled the organization “extremist” in December 2022.
The men gave Ivan a choice. He could either become their informant, or they would take him straight to jail, where he would face a 15-year prison sentence for participating in an “extremist” chat group.
After Ivan agreed to the first option, he was made to sign a nondisclosure document and then driven to Moscow’s city center in an unmarked car, where he was released at a metro station. “We’ll write you on Telegram,” one of the men said by way of a farewell.
Shortly after, Ivan received a first message proposing a meeting outside the building where he was studying, in what would be the first of several tête-à-têtes.
Mostly, however, the agents stayed in touch with him online, through messages and calls on Telegram.
One agent, tall and slender, took on an almost brotherly role, giving Ivan family advice, offering to sort out “trouble” with his studies, and suggesting he could shield Ivan from being drafted into Russia’s armed forces and sent to fight in Ukraine.
“I’ve talked it through, no one’s going to take you into the army,” the agent wrote in late November 2024, seemingly seeking to soothe Ivan’s concerns that he’d be recruited into the army. Ivan’s case, he promised, was under his “personal control.”
The other agent, of stockier build, seemed to have been tasked with ensuring compliance through intimidation.
“We had high hopes that you’d help us with information, but based on our interaction, you don’t seem to share that desire,” he wrote menacingly on one occasion.
Once, after Ivan had repeatedly come up with excuses not to meet in person, the agent appeared to lose his patience: “I’m a decent person, don’t try to play me for a fool. No one’s rushing to be friends with you. We have a joint job to do!”
The invitation to have a beer, he continued, is “to motivate you,” and to show “we’re not animals and we need your help, which, so far, you haven’t provided.”
Now and then, the roles were reversed.
“Ivan, please fucking take care of finding and reestablishing contact with Vesna, got it?” the first agent said during one call.
“Yes, I’m trying, I understand, ok,” Ivan replied, audibly stressed, which only seemed to further irritate the agent.
“What are you nervous about? Am I pressuring you? Relax. Breathe. Everything will be alright. Ok?”
‘You’d better call me real quick’
The two agents made no secret of what they were after: information about the Kremlin’s critics, most of whom had fled abroad to avoid landing in prison as Moscow cracked down on dissent following its invasion.
“They [the activists] are actively working and constantly recruiting,” the second agent wrote. “The point is to understand which specific activities are taking place in which countries.”
“Why did you go abroad?” the second agent wrote. “You’d better call me real quick.”
‘A valuable target’
It’s not clear how successful the FSB has been in recruiting informants within opposition circles. But Ivan’s story is not unique, noted Kashevarov, who said he personally knew two similar cases where the FSB had tried to recruit former activists.
Independent intelligence analysis takes time and resources — if this work matters to you, please consider supporting it by donating HERE
ller said. The well-wishes then took a darker turn: “Don’t forget your homeland. And share more information.”
The student — who we have agreed to call Ivan because of fears for his safety — felt intimidated, but not surprised.
Throughout the previous year he’d been harassed by the same man and his colleague, both Russian intelligence officers. It had begun 16 months earlier, after Ivan had been detained by them and offered a deal: Inform on his acquaintances in anti-Kremlin circles, many of whom had fled abroad, or go to prison.
The New Year’s call is part of a cache of text messages and recorded conversations between Ivan and his handlers that were shared with POLITICO.
At a time when the Kremlin is waging a widening campaign of sabotage and espionage across Europe, they offer rare documentary insight into how Russian intelligence agencies recruit, coerce and manage informants.
As this long-standing practice extends beyond Russia’s borders, it poses new challenges for European host countries and their intelligence agencies.
The conversations — which took place between the summers of 2023 and 2025 — reveal a “good cop, bad cop” routine to pressure Ivan to infiltrate the online communication of an opposition group and report on their activities in Europe from Moscow.
The men were hungry for seemingly trivial details, and their interest wasn’t limited to Russian citizens. They also wanted specifics about those — Russian or otherwise — helping emigrés in Europe, whether they be language teachers or foreign ministry officials in the countries where the dissidents had found new homes.
“Find out who is in Europe and in which country, and who is helping them, incl. specialist organizations,” reads one message.
When Ivan told one of the handlers about a rally in Berlin in November 2024 protesting Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the agent pushed for more: “I’m telling you, describe it, describe it, send me a report,” he wrote. “Don’t make me chase you.”
“We know everything already, but we’d like to know more,” another message reads.
‘Disposable assets’
Since Moscow’s all-out attack on Ukraine, hundreds of thousands of Russians have left the country, among them some of the Kremlin’s most vocal critics.
In Europe they hoped to find safety. Instead they have become both the targets of, and desired assets for, the Russian security services.
While much attention has focused on “disposable agents” recruited online for acts of sabotage or vandalism, the conversations shared by Ivan point to a different tactic: the long-term cultivation of informants embedded within opposition circles themselves.
“We need to be prepared to live with this for a long time to come,” said Andrei Soldatov, a leading expert on Russian intelligence.
Last year, in the first known espionage case against a Russian political dissident in Europe since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Poland put Igor Rogov — an exiled opposition activist-turned-student — on trial in the southern city of Sosnowiec.
Authorities accused Rogov of being connected to a bomb plot and of spying on fellow Russian exiles as well as the Polish government officials and university staff, including language teachers, who were helping them settle into a new life.
According to the indictment, Rogov was recruited in Russia by the federal security service (FSB) several years before his departure, and continued his role as an informant in exile. Rogov’s lawyer declined to comment on the case but court documents seen by POLITICO say he admitted to working for the FSB.
For the Russian security services, building networks of informants inside exile circles has a dual purpose, Soldatov said.
As long as informants remain unexposed, they can provide Moscow with information on the whereabouts, personal lives and vulnerabilities of the Kremlin’s critics at a time when it has diminished access to them because of the expulsion of dozens of Russian spies. And if an informant gets caught, as in Rogov’s case, it fosters distrust — both within activist circles and between them and their host countries.
“Either way, it’s a win-win,” Soldatov said.
While Moscow publicly dismisses exiled opposition figures as marginal and irrelevant, the attention it pays to them betrays a deep insecurity. In addition to infiltration efforts, Russian authorities continue to open criminal proceedings against Kremlin critics, even in absentia, labeling them “extremists” or “terrorists.”
The logic of the security services, Soldatov explained, is that while today’s exiles may appear unimportant, so did Vladimir Lenin before the 1917 revolutions that brought down the then-czar and more than 300 years of Romanov rule.
“From the FSB’s perspective, they can’t afford even a 1-percent chance that these people could one day undermine Russia’s political stability” or threaten Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hold on power, Soldatov said.
‘Don’t try to play me for a fool’
Ivan’s troubles started in the summer of 2023. He’d just walked out of the jet bridge after landing at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport — back from visiting his parents in a Russian city that’s а two-and-a-half-hour flight away — when he was approached by two men in civilian clothes and two uniformed police officers who confiscated his phone and his passport.
The two men in civilian clothes introduced themselves as investigators for especially important cases, an elite FSB department tasked with state crimes. They flashed their badges at him, too quickly to see, and walked him to the baggage carousel.
As they waited with Ivan for his bags, they began casually pressing him about his personal life, his student debts and his parents — “things that they could only have found out from monitoring my communication,” Ivan recalled. “They were looking for pressure points.”
Afterward, in a room used by airport police, the conversation took a more serious turn. The two men confronted him with an organizational chart with his name and photograph and those of several acquaintances, accusing him — accurately — of having belonged to the youth group Vesna.
Тhe pro-democracy group had initially made a name for itself with satirical, mediagenic protests. In 2017 they held a “funeral for Russia’s future” ahead of a presidential election that gave Putin yet another term. А year later they hung a banner from a bridge in St. Petersburg reading “This World Cup is filled with blood,” ahead of the finals of the football tournament that Russia was hosting.
Following Moscow’s full-scale assault on Ukraine, Vesna had grown into one of the country’s main opposition forces, helping coordinate and encourage anti-war and anti-Kremlin protests.
The two agents also showed Ivan another document that appeared to include highlighted excerpts from a Vesna chat on Telegram, which had been deleted after a Russian court labeled the organization “extremist” in December 2022.
The men gave Ivan a choice. He could either become their informant, or they would take him straight to jail, where he would face a 15-year prison sentence for participating in an “extremist” chat group.
After Ivan agreed to the first option, he was made to sign a nondisclosure document and then driven to Moscow’s city center in an unmarked car, where he was released at a metro station. “We’ll write you on Telegram,” one of the men said by way of a farewell.
Shortly after, Ivan received a first message proposing a meeting outside the building where he was studying, in what would be the first of several tête-à-têtes.
Mostly, however, the agents stayed in touch with him online, through messages and calls on Telegram.
One agent, tall and slender, took on an almost brotherly role, giving Ivan family advice, offering to sort out “trouble” with his studies, and suggesting he could shield Ivan from being drafted into Russia’s armed forces and sent to fight in Ukraine.
“I’ve talked it through, no one’s going to take you into the army,” the agent wrote in late November 2024, seemingly seeking to soothe Ivan’s concerns that he’d be recruited into the army. Ivan’s case, he promised, was under his “personal control.”
The other agent, of stockier build, seemed to have been tasked with ensuring compliance through intimidation.
“We had high hopes that you’d help us with information, but based on our interaction, you don’t seem to share that desire,” he wrote menacingly on one occasion.
Once, after Ivan had repeatedly come up with excuses not to meet in person, the agent appeared to lose his patience: “I’m a decent person, don’t try to play me for a fool. No one’s rushing to be friends with you. We have a joint job to do!”
The invitation to have a beer, he continued, is “to motivate you,” and to show “we’re not animals and we need your help, which, so far, you haven’t provided.”
Now and then, the roles were reversed.
“Ivan, please fucking take care of finding and reestablishing contact with Vesna, got it?” the first agent said during one call.
“Yes, I’m trying, I understand, ok,” Ivan replied, audibly stressed, which only seemed to further irritate the agent.
“What are you nervous about? Am I pressuring you? Relax. Breathe. Everything will be alright. Ok?”
‘You’d better call me real quick’
The two agents made no secret of what they were after: information about the Kremlin’s critics, most of whom had fled abroad to avoid landing in prison as Moscow cracked down on dissent following its invasion.
“They [the activists] are actively working and constantly recruiting,” the second agent wrote. “The point is to understand which specific activities are taking place in which countries.”
“Why did you go abroad?” the second agent wrote. “You’d better call me real quick.”
‘A valuable target’
It’s not clear how successful the FSB has been in recruiting informants within opposition circles. But Ivan’s story is not unique, noted Kashevarov, who said he personally knew two similar cases where the FSB had tried to recruit former activists.
Independent intelligence analysis takes time and resources — if this work matters to you, please consider supporting it by donating HERE