Corruption (fraud, bribes): Russia and the world

Russia

Anti-corruption charter of Russian business

The Charter provides for the introduction of anti-corruption programs into the Corporation's policy, monitoring and assessment of their implementation, effective financial control, the principle of publicity of anti-corruption measures, refusal to illegally obtain advantages, participation in tenders based on the principles of transparency and competition, information anti-corruption and other measures.

According to Art. 9 of the Federal Law of December 25, 2008 No. 273-FZ "On Combating Corruption," a state or municipal employee who reported facts of corruption "is protected by the state in accordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation." This provision is specified in the decree of the President of the Russian Federation of April 2, 2013 No. 309. The document says that disciplinary action can be applied to such a civil servant only following a meeting of the certification commission. In addition, Federal Law No. 324-FZ of 21 November 2011 "On Free Legal Assistance" guarantees citizens free assistance in preparing complaints about corruption, as well as in preparing reports of violation of their rights in connection with these appeals.

2024

The largest bribes in the history of Russia. Top-3

One of the largest bribes in the history of Russia were former employees of the Bureau of Special Technical Events MINISTRY OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS OF THE RUSSIAN Georgy Satyukov and Dmitry Sokolov, former governor Chelyabinsk region Mikhail Yurevich and deputy State Dumas Vadim Belousov, as well as the former head of the T department of the GUEBiPK Ministry of Internal Affairs, Colonel Dmitry Zakharchenko. In total, they received 10 billion, rubles as stated in the materials published on October 8, 2024.

The top 3 bribes are headed by Satyukov and Sokolov. According to the Kommersant newspaper, from 2019 to 2021 they received 5 billion rubles from the sysadmin of the crypto exchange World Exchange Services Pte. Ltd by Alexei Ivanov for "general patronage." Satyukov and Sokolov are wanted and are in the UAE.

Top 3 largest bribes in the history of Russia

In second place in terms of bribes are Yurevich and Belousov with 3.4 billion rubles. This money was received from contractors for permission to repair and build roads in the Chelyabinsk region. In August 2022, Belousov was sentenced in absentia to 10 years in prison and put on the wanted list. Jurewicz, who is reportedly in Britain, is also wanted. Russia

Zakharchenko closes the top three with bribes worth 1.6 billion rubles. At the same time, assets estimated at 9 billion rubles were confiscated from him. Zakharchenko received bribes from the capital's restaurateur and from top managers of the Group of Companies 1520. He was convicted by the Presnensky District Court of Moscow for 16 years.

At the same time, a new record for the volume of bribes was set by the former head of the investigative department of the TFR in the Tver district of Moscow, Marat Tambiev. According to investigators, he received more than 2,718 bitcoins (7.3 billion rubles at the exchange rate at the time of the transfer of cryptocurrency) and $1.5 million from members of the hacker group Infraud Organization. The money was paid to the security forces for making various procedural decisions, including in the criminal case of cybercriminals.^[1]

The state prosecution requested 20 years of strict regime for the ex-head of the ICR department, accused of receiving a record bribe from hackers

On September 11, 2024, state prosecutor Nadezhda Tikhonova, during a meeting in the Balashikha City Court of the Moscow Region, demanded that Marat Tambiev, the former head of the investigative department of the TFR in the Tver District of Moscow, be sentenced to 20 years of strict regime. The man is accused of receiving a bribe in the amount of more than 2,718 bitcoins (7.3 billion rubles at the time of receipt) and $1.5 million - this is a record amount that has ever appeared in a bribery trial in Russia. Read more here

2023

12 billion rubles of unreasonable income of officials were sent to the budget of the Russian Federation for the year

For incomplete 2023, bailiffs in Russia transferred to the budget about 12.5 billion rubles, recovered from the claims of the prosecutor's office from officials as unconfirmed legally income. This was reported to the Federal Bailiff Service (FSSP) on December 8, 2023. Read more here.

Putin allowed to sell real estate seized from corrupt officials at auctions

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on the sale of housing seized from corrupt officials at auctions. The corresponding document was published on July 24, 2023.

The law concerns residential premises, the cost of which in the secondary market is two or more times higher than the regional average. Cheaper apartments, as before, will be given to local authorities to be transferred to citizens for social rent.

If the property is not bought out at the first auction, the price of it will be reduced by 5% and re-bidding is scheduled. If the second auction is declared invalid, the next auction may be held no earlier than six months later, the document says.

It also says that earlier in the Russian Federation there was no procedure and grounds for the paid sale of residential premises entering the state housing stock. At the same time, the property of the state treasury contains a significant amount of residential premises converted into the ownership of the Russian Federation. Often this is housing of a large area and increased comfort.

The current mechanism for managing housing seized for corruption crimes is ineffective and does not allow achieving targeted support for needy categories of citizens, "said Sergei Gavrilov, head of the profile committee on property, land and property relations, at the end of July 2023.

Sergei Altukhov, a member of the State Duma Committee on Economic Policy, cited data from the Prosecutor General's Office, according to which property worth almost 200 billion rubles was seized from unscrupulous Russian officials in the last three years alone.

As a rule, these are land plots, apartments, cars, the cost of which was not confirmed by the income of civil servants, - said the deputy at the end of July 2023.

Federal Law No. 24.07.2023 of 354-FZ

2022

Damage from corruption in Russia exceeded 37 billion rubles

The damage from corruption crimes for incomplete 2022 amounted to more than 37 billion rubles. The Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Krasnov said this in an interview with TASS (excerpts from it were published on December 9, 2022).

According to him, it is noteworthy that in 2022 the amount of the arrested property exceeded the amount of damage. This has not happened for several years. In total, funds were withdrawn in the amount of 62.2 billion rubles, another 3.5 billion rubles were reimbursed voluntarily, Krasnov noted.

He stressed that for law enforcement agencies the main priority is to recover damage from corruption crimes, because the correct investigation of such cases cannot be limited to identifying the perpetrators and only.

Шаблон:Quote 'Mandatory comprehensive measures should be taken to compensate for harm both in the investigation of criminal cases and in the conduct of operational-search measures, - added the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation. According to him, the measures implemented by law enforcement agencies with the coordinating role of the prosecutor's office in recent years have made it possible to significantly intensify the activities of operational and investigative bodies aimed at establishing the financial situation of the accused and suspects.

Шаблон:Quote 'This also applies to property located abroad, as well as in the possession and use of third parties - nominal owners, - said the Prosecutor General. As Igor Krasnov emphasized, prosecutors also play an active role in this - in the nine months of this [2022] year, the courts recovered about 1 billion rubles of damage caused by corruption crimes at the claims of the prosecutor's office.

According to to data State Offices of Public Prosecutor the first quarter of 2022, more than half of the corruption crimes committed Russia in accounted for bribery.^[2]

Prosecutor General Krasnov: Russia began to give bribes in cryptocurrencies

In December 2022 Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Igor Krasnov , he spoke about the fact that cases of transmission shall be recorded bribes began in the country. to cryptocurrency Read more. here

72 thousand officials convicted of bribes in Russia

Since 2011, about 72 thousand officials have been brought to trial for corruption crimes. Alexander Bastrykin, chairman of the Investigative Committee of Russia, spoke about this in an interview with RIA Novosti in December 2022.

According to him, in 2022 he prosecuted 60 officials for corruption in the Russian military-industrial complex, 250 in the field of state contracts and public procurement, including 27 in the implementation of the state defense order.

In addition, the chairman of the UK said that in just nine months of 2022, more than 8.7 thousand cases of crimes of this category were received by the courts, when in 2021 there were ten percent fewer of them - 8,011.

In 2022, investigators sent more than five thousand corruption cases to the courts, 1,169 cases of fraud - this is slightly more than in 2021. Completed 458 misappropriation or embezzlement cases.

On December 7, 2022, criminal cases were initiated against two employees of the Ministry of Construction, Housing and Communal Services, Road Services and Transport of the Orenburg Region. They are accused of corruption. Prior to that, on December 2, 2022, the Presnensky Court of Moscow detained the deputy head of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Emergency Situations - the chief inspector for small courts in Moscow, Sergei Zotov. He was detained on suspicion of taking a bribe.

According to the chairman of the National Anti-Corruption Committee, Kirill Kabanov, the greatest difficulty is the disclosure of bribes on an especially large scale, since senior officials are often involved in such crimes. While petty bribery is more common, although it is easier to disclose, he added in a conversation with Izvestia.

Basically, municipal employees of a lower rank and unscrupulous law enforcement officers sin this, - said Kabanov.[3]

IT systems are being introduced in Kazan to combat corruption

Kazan In introduced digital systems to combat corruption violations. This became known in early December 2022. More. here

Fraudsters lured $900 thousand from Gorshkolepov's mother.

As it became known on May 12, 2022, fraudsters lured $900 thousand from the mother of the former deputy head of the department of property relations of the Ministry of Defense Alexander Gorshkolepov, convicted of bribes. Read more here.

A law was signed on the seizure of corrupt funds of officials in favor of the state

President Russia Vladimir Putin on March 6, 2022 signed a law states on the seizure of officials in favor of corruption funds.

The law provides for the possibility of applying money to the state's income in the official's accounts if the amount exceeds his income for three years.

It is assumed that the amount will be withdrawn if reliable information confirming the legality of their receipt is not provided.

Ex-FSO employee accused of bribes worth 20 million rubles during the construction of Putin's residence

As it became known on January 13, 2022, the ex-employee of engineering and technical support FSO Alexey Golokhvostov was accused of bribes at the construction presidential residence Russia Vladimir Putin in Novo-Ogaryovo. More. here

2021

Convicted of bribes less than 10 thousand rubles in Russia increased by 40%

The number of those convicted of bribes less than 10 thousand rubles in Russia at the end of 2021 increased by 40% compared to 2020 and amounted to 1816 people. Such data at the end of April 2022 was published by the judicial department at the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation.

According to the same statistics, in cases in which we are talking about the amount of 1 million rubles, 263 people were convicted - more than in 2020, by 10%, writes Kommersant. 2,479 people were convicted of trying to give or receive a bribe from 10,000 to 50,000 rubles. 2,478 people were convicted of providing and receiving non-property services in 2021.

In 2021, 8721 people were convicted of giving and receiving a bribe or commercial bribery - this is a quarter higher than a year earlier. 45 people were acquitted, 794 received real terms, 1397 were conditionally convicted, 3240 were fined. 1,143 people were convicted of bribes, 1935 - for extortion.

As the newspaper notes, if in the segment of small bribes the number of convicted bribe-givers is several times higher than the number of bribes, then as the price of the issue increases, the ratio changes. And for example, in the category "over a million rubles" there are only 28 bribe-givers per 142 bribe-takers.

Leonid Golovko, head of the criminal process department of the law faculty of Moscow State University, explained that such a difference in statistics depends on the nature of the crime. A small bribe can only be confirmed by fixing red-handed; in this case, there is no long negotiation process or mediators. In case of corruption in a more expensive segment, the operation is planned: in this case, either the bribe giver acts under control, or his role is played by an operational employee. They are not responsible for giving a bribe, so the ratio of bribes and bribes is different.^[4]

HSE: average kickbacks in public procurement - 22.5%

The average size of kickbacks in public procurement in the Russian Federation is 22.5%, according to a study conducted by the Institute of State and Municipal Administration of the Higher School of Economics on the basis of an anonymous survey of Russian companies. The data were released on December 20, 2021. Read more here.

2,500 bribes worth ₽1,1 billion registered in Russia

In 2021, employees of the economic security and anti-corruption service MINISTRY OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS Russia revealed 2.5 thousand facts of receiving bribes totaling 1.1 billion rubles. This was reported on December 9, 2021 TASS by the agency with reference to the head of the Main Directorate of Economic Security and Anti-Corruption of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, Police Lieutenant General Andrei Kurnosenko.

According to him, 768 episodes accounted for large or especially large bribes. In total, the Ministry of Internal Affairs managed to suppress about 2.4 thousand facts of bribery (Article 291 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) for a total amount of more than 685 million rubles, 407 of them on a large or especially large scale, their total amount amounted to about 607 million rubles.

According to the Federal Bailiff Service, which was released on December 9, 2021, the Pension Fund of the Russian Federation over the past two years has received 7.7 billion rubles seized from officials and their families, not confirmed by legal income.

According to Prosecutor General Igor Krasnov in an interview with RIA Novosti in December 2021, for the first time in several years, the cost of arrested and seized property in criminal cases (53.8 billion rubles) exceeded the amount of established damage (53.2 billion rubles). Krasnov added that, according to him, another 15 billion rubles were voluntarily reimbursed. In total, the amount recovered through the courts from corrupt officials has grown sixfold since the beginning of the year, to 727 million rubles, the prosecutor general reported.

Earlier, Krasnov proposed not to apply court fines to petty corrupt officials, so as not to exempt them from criminal liability.

One official can receive 10 thousand rubles for his "services," and the other - more than 1 million rubles. It all depends on the position, the type of so-called services, the prices of contracts concluded, the amounts of allocated budget funds and many other factors, - said Andrei Kurnosenko in December 2021.[5]

Ericsson manager gave officials millions of bribes for government contracts

On September 8, 2021, information appeared that one of the managers of Ericsson gave officials large bribes for government contracts. We are talking about a 53-year-old citizen of Ethiopia and SwedenAfwerka Bereket. He, as established by the investigation, helped pay bribes in the amount of $2.1 million to officials of the executive branch of Djibouti and its state telecommunications company in order to receive a contract worth €20.3 million ($24 million). Read more here.

Putin instructed security officials to report on new forms of corruption using digital technologies

In mid-August 2021, the president Russia Vladimir Putin approved the National Anti-Corruption Plan for 2021-2024. The document includes a number of instructions for departments.

Thus, the Investigative Committee, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the FSB were instructed to submit to the Administration by March 1 a consolidated analytical report on new forms of corruption related to the use of digital technologies.

In addition, the Prosecutor General's Office will have to submit proposals for improving the legal regulation of issues by July 15, 2021, related to the detection and suppression of corruption crimes, the subject of which are digital financial assets, other digital rights, digital currency, as well as with the discovery, arrest and subsequent return of digital assets to the state by the victim and circulation of digital assets to the state, other digital rights, digital currency obtained as a result of the commission of these crimes.

The Ministry of Finance with the participation of the Ministry of Labor, the Ministry of Digital Development and the Central Bank was instructed to submit proposals for verifying the reliability and completeness of information on the ownership of digital assets and digital currency.

The Central Bank will have to assess the feasibility of empowering officials responsible for the fight against corruption in the regions with the right to send requests to credit organizations, the tax office, bodies that register real estate rights, as well as operators of IT systems that issue digital financial assets.

The instructions also relate to clarifying the wording in the laws, training business, toughening the punishment for corruption. The President instructed to analyze corruption risks when making decisions on the allocation of subsidies from budgets.

Other instructions include considering the possibility of applying anti-corruption standards to interim officers. Now, in some regions, they are not required to file income declarations.^[6]

Launch of rehabilitation program for officials convicted of corruption in Spain

In May 2021, it became known about the launch in Spain of a rehabilitation program for officials convicted of corruption who cannot stop stealing. The course is designed for 11 months and includes 32 group therapy sessions on the topics of "personal abilities" and "values" under the supervision of psychiatrists. At these events, prisoners are invited to admit their mistakes and ask forgiveness from their victims.

Rehabilitation programs for former civil servants serving time for corruption have been launched in nine Spanish prisons. More than 2 thousand prisoners were involved in them, reports The New York Times.

In the future, his biggest problem may be the difficulty in convincing corrupt Spanish officials that something is really wrong with them, admits former judge Ángel Louis Ortiz, who now heads Spain's prisons.

These are people with money and power, and we are struggling with the idea that they can get away with everything and do not need help, "he said.

Defendants in many major theft scandals take part in the program to correct corrupt officials. Among them is the brother-in-law of the Spanish king Felippus VI Iñaki Urdangarin, who received a five-year term in connection with the "Noos case." He was found guilty of embezzlement of 6.2 million euros. Former 75-year-old notary Carlos Alburquerque also attends the lesson. He was sentenced to 4 years for stealing 400 thousand euros.

Taking part in this program in the future may allow a convicted official to leave places of detention on parole.

Earlier, the international organization Transparency International (entered by the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation in the register of NGOs acting as a foreign agent) ranked Spain 32nd among 180 countries in terms of the spread of corruption.^[7]

Socialists will again submit to the Duma a law on the abolition of the statute of limitations in corruption cases

- The statute of limitations should not interfere with the disclosure of corruption crimes, - said in May 2021 the chairman of the party "Fair Russia - For Truth," the head of the Duma faction "SR" Sergei Mironov.

On the eve of the Tverskoy Court of Moscow, in connection with the expiration of the statute of limitations, he stopped the criminal prosecution of the auditor of the Accounts Chamber, ex-Minister of Construction and Housing and Communal Services Mikhail Me, who was accused of embezzlement on a large scale allegedly committed by him when he was governor of the Ivanovo region.

"I am convinced that this outcome of the case will not satisfy anyone. Some will be convinced that a high-ranking embezzlement has gone away from punishment, others will consider that this whole case was started in order to demonstratively compromise the auditor of the Accounts Chamber, which itself is a key tool for controlling the spending of budget funds. In any case, the statute of limitations is perceived by society as a trick that prevented us from finding out the truth and restoring justice, "the parliamentarian said.

The leader of the socialists recalled that in 2016 the SR faction submitted to the State Duma a bill to abolish the statute of limitations for corruption crimes. Among them are misuse of budget funds, abuse of office, taking a bribe, official forgery, bringing a knowingly innocent person to criminal responsibility.

"Like many of our anti-corruption initiatives, this project was rejected by the Duma majority. However, our position remains unchanged: we demand to ratify Article 20 of the UN Convention against Corruption, which provides for punishment for illegal enrichment, impose confiscation of property of corrupt officials and their families if they do not prove the legality of its acquisition, and also prohibit parole for convicted embezzlers. This also includes the abolition of the statute of limitations for corruption acts. In the Duma of the new convocation, we will be among the first to introduce such a law, "concluded Sergei Mironov.

The Duma named the necessary conditions for defeating corruption

The chairman of the party "Fair Russia - For Truth," the head of the Duma faction "SR" Sergei Mironov skeptically appreciated the next anti-corruption initiative of the government. The parliamentarian said this on March 24 at a press approach before the plenary session of the chamber. The other day, a bill was submitted to the State Duma, which allows you to pay money to the state if they could not confirm their legal origin.

"Everything seems to be great, everything is really great, but what is embarrassing - the authors of the initiative mean funds in the bank accounts of a civil servant and his closest relatives. Only which of the corrupt officials is so naive as to keep what was stolen in banks?! This public prefers cash. We recently saw personnel of a search in the house of ex-governor Belozertsev. They found half a billion rubles from him, which were lying literally everywhere - in bags, envelopes wrapped in newspapers. So the idea laid down in the bill may be good, but such a norm will not work, since it does not take into account life realities, "the deputy believes.

According to the socialist leader, in order to effectively combat embezzlement, it is necessary to ratify article 20 of the UN Convention on Combating Corruption and introduce an article on illegal enrichment into the Criminal Code. It is necessary to equate corruption with treason, to abolish the statute of limitations and parole for such crimes, to provide for the confiscation of property not only of convicted corrupt officials, but also of their relatives.

"We have repeatedly come out with such proposals and will continue to insist on their adoption, otherwise the theft of the country will continue at the same pace!," Concluded Mironov.

Former top manager of Rostelecom Andrei Levakov arrested for a large bribe

On February 18, 2021, the Basmanny Court of Moscow arrested Andrei Levakov for two months, who is accused of receiving a bribe on an especially large scale (part 6 of article 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). Read more here.

2020

Recovery from officials unreasonably purchased property for 8 billion rubles

In 2020, unreasonably purchased property worth 8 billion rubles was recovered from Russian officials. This was announced in July 2021 by the head of the department for supervision over the implementation of anti-corruption legislation of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation Viktor Baldin.

We are talking about the seizure of property from civil servants who could not confirm the legality of their income. As an example, Baldin cited a former municipal deputy in one of the regions of Russia, from whom, by a court decision, they took away:

• 12 land plots;
• 12 vehicles;
• one residential premises in the amount of more than 22 million rubles;
• cash in the amount of over 12 million rubles.

In total, property and funds equivalent to almost 400 thousand euros were recovered from this official. Part of all this belonged to the wife of the ex-deputy.

According to Viktor Baldin, in addition to these amounts, prosecutors for 2020 managed to recover in the courts about 4 billion rubles of damage caused by corruption. He noted that measures are being taken to recover damage out of court.

The head of the department for supervision over the implementation of anti-corruption legislation of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation also cited data according to which more than 200 extrajudicial measures of the prosecutor's response were taken in 2020, thanks to which almost 600 million rubles were received in the budget.

Earlier, the Prosecutor General of Russia Igor Krasnov reported an increase in corruption offenses in Russia. According to him, in 2020, prosecutors identified almost 2 thousand officials whose expenses did not correspond to income. At the same time, the amount of unconfirmed incomes of civil servants for the year increased by about three times.

In 2020, the preparation of bills began, which will allow to withdraw dubious income of officials and send them to the Pension Fund. We are talking about dubious bank accounts.^[8]

Growth in the volume of property arrested from those accused of corruption up to 10 billion rubles

At the end of 2020, courts in Russia arrested property worth 10 billion rubles from those accused of corruption, which is 3 billion rubles more than a year earlier. Such data were presented by the Chairman of the Investigative Committee of Russia (TFR) Alexander Bastrykin on March 5, 2021 at a meeting following the results of the work of the department.

According to him, in 2020, more than 18.5 thousand criminal cases of corruption crimes were initiated, including more than 9.9 thousand on the facts of bribery, which is 5.5% more in comparison with 2019. 8639 corruption cases were sent to the courts, more than 9.5 thousand people were brought to justice.

The head of the TFR also noted that when justifying claims for circulation of illegally acquired property of the defendants to the state, the evidence collected by the investigators was used.

In 2020, the Prosecutor General's Office named the regions with the highest level of corruption. They were Mordovia, Chuvashia, Kamchatka, Arkhangelsk, Bryansk, Magadan, Novgorod, Orenburg, Saratov and Tyumen regions. In these regions, the corruption crime rate ranged from 29.68 to 26.31 offenses per 100 thousand population.

The lowest level of bribery was registered in Ingushetia, Khakassia, Altai Territory, Vologda, Moscow, Murmansk and Penza regions, as well as in St. Petersburg, Sevastopol and the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug. The corresponding coefficient there is from 6.41 to 9.94. In the country as a whole, the level of corruption crime amounted to 21.1 offenses per 100 thousand inhabitants.

Most of the crimes related to corruption were identified in the development of budget money, including those allocated for the implementation of targeted programs, as well as in the organization of tenders, property management, control, audit and law enforcement activities and in the field of housing and communal services.^[9]

The number of convicts on charges of corruption in the Russian Federation reached 7.5 thousand people

In 2020, 7.5 thousand people were convicted in Russia on charges of corruption. This was announced by the Chairman of the Supreme Court (SC) Vyacheslav Lebedev at a meeting of judges of courts of general jurisdiction and arbitration courts of the Russian Federation, dedicated to summing up the results of 2020.

According to TASS, the Information Agency of Russia with reference to the presentation to the report of the head of the Armed Forces, most often in 2020 sentences were passed to those accused of petty bribery (receiving, giving or mediation in bribes in the amount of up to 10 thousand rubles):

• under this article, 22% of all those accused of corruption crimes, or about 1.7 thousand people, were convicted;
• in second place are those convicted of giving a bribe (18%, or about 1.4 thousand people);
• on the third - in receiving a bribe (15%, or more than 1.1 thousand persons)
• on the fourth - convicted of mediation in bribes (4%), for commercial bribery or mediation in commercial bribery (3%);
• about 38%, or almost 3 thousand people, were convicted of other corruption crimes.

Prosecutor General Igor Krasnov at the end of 2020 said that only a third of the money that can be collected from those accused of corruption actually goes to the budget - 9.4 billion out of 35 billion rubles in a year and a half.

To increase the collection of "debts," the Prosecutor General then announced his intention to strengthen supervision of the actions of bailiffs who should find the property of corrupt officials, as well as create a special working group to ensure the execution of court decisions on penalties.

It is noted that after the appearance in 2016 in the Criminal Code of Art. 291.2 (petty bribery), the number of convicts under the main articles on giving and receiving bribes decreased sharply: a significant part of the crimes began to take place according to a new, less serious composition.

Vyacheslav Lebedev recalled that in the first half of 2021, a resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation on judicial practice in criminal cases on crimes against the interests of service in commercial and other organizations, including on abuse of authority when fulfilling a state defense order, will be adopted.^{[10][11][12][13]}

Russian bribe-takers have accumulated billions of rubles in debt

Criminals convicted of corruption accumulated fines in the amount of 31 billion rubles in 2020. This was reported by the Federal Bailiff Service, the Russian Information Agency reports to TASS in January 2021.

They noted that from January to November 2020, the bailiffs had 8.5 thousand proceedings for collecting fines from corrupt officials for 34.5 billion rubles. At the same time, by December, more than two thousand cases were closed, Russian bribe-takers paid off debts worth 3.5 billion rubles.

In total, the average fine debt at the end of last year was about five million rubles, three years earlier it slightly exceeded three million rubles.

Bailiffs are looking for more than 600 convicted corrupt officials who owe 1.5 billion rubles. In addition, their property is wanted for a total amount of 1.7 billion rubles.

In December, the head of the Investigative Committee of Russia (TFR), Alexander Bastrykin, said that since the beginning of 2020, 15.2 thousand criminal cases have been opened in the country over corruption. This is four percent more than a year ago. Since 2011, more than 90 thousand criminal cases have been transferred to court. Bastrykin called corruption a transnational problem. It reduces the confidence of citizens in power, the investment attractiveness of the country and slows down its development, he said.

NAC: The IT industry in Russia has the highest risks of corruption

On December 9, 2020, the National Anti-Corruption Committee reported that information technology remains the industry in Russia with the greatest risks of corruption.

Such a topic as IT and digitalization remain in the sector of high corruption risk and are most attractive for criminal-rental business, where the indicator can reach 70%, - said the chairman of the NAC, member of the HRC Kirill Kabanov (quoted by RIA Novosti).

According to him, the high risks of corruption in the IT sphere are associated with its opacity and constant injections of budget funds.

He added that housing and communal services and construction are at risk. The issue is especially acute in the regions. There are also such subjects in Russia where people trust the authorities and the entrepreneurial sector is constantly developing. Kabanov cited Tatarstan, Bashkiria, Tula and Kostroma regions as examples. In these regions, there is a high level of public confidence in the authorities and a real growth in the development of the entrepreneurial sector, Kabanov said.

He added that for corrupt officials, the distribution of budget funds in terms of attractiveness remains in the first place, while on private examples it can be seen that correctly organized anti-corruption procedures and building an appropriate anti-corruption system gives a concrete result. As examples, he cited Rosatom, Rostelecom and Rosseti.

Alexander Tarasenko, Director of Risk Management Consulting at KPMG in Russia and the CIS, named two main signs indicating possible corruption in IT departments: growth in information technology costs and opaque IT purchases If more than 15% of the IT budget goes to one counterparty or several related companies, although we are not talking about unique, but about standard equipment and software, this is an occasion to be wary and study the procurement process, the expert believes.^[14]

Corrupt officials pay less than a third of the recovered to the budget - Prosecutor General

Less than a third of the amounts collected from corrupt officials can actually be returned to the treasury, Prosecutor General Russia Igor Krasnov said.

"There is a big gap between the amount of claims of prosecutors satisfied by the courts and the funds actually entering the treasury," Krasnov said in a December 2020 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

Over the past year and a half, prosecutors in the framework of criminal, civil and arbitration proceedings have filed claims totaling over 35 billion rubles, the prosecutor general said. Revenues to the budget from penalties, according to him, amounted to only 9.4 billion rubles.

Krasnov also said that fines totaling 1.2 billion rubles were imposed for committing corruption-related administrative offenses in the same period, of which only half were recovered - 639 million rubles.

"That is why in July of this year, at the board of the Prosecutor General's Office, I set a clear task for the prosecutors to seek timely and full compensation for damage caused by acts of corruption," the head of the department said.

The head of the drug control of Khakassia was sentenced to 8 years in prison for a bribe in bitcoins

On September 22, 2020, the Supreme Court of Khakassia sentenced the former head of the department for combating drug trafficking in the republican. MINISTRY OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS Yuri Zaitsev He was found guilty of taking a bribe and disclosing state secrets. The punishment is eight years in a general regime colony. More. here

Russia has sufficiently implemented less than half of the recommendations to combat corruption - GRECO

As part of the anti-corruption campaign, Russia has satisfactorily implemented nine out of 21 recommendations from 2017 by the Group of Anti-Corruption States (GRECO) under the Council of Europe, Interfax reported in August, citing a GRECO press release timed to coincide with the organization's next report.

At the same time, GRECO clarified that the Russian authorities partially implemented nine more recommendations, and four other recommendations were unfulfilled.

"GRECO notes that in the case of Members of Parliament, certain successes have been made: The State Duma and the Federation Council adopted codes of ethics, although they ignored such important issues as contacts (authorities - ed.) With third-party organizations and restrictions on activities after leaving office, "the document says, a link to which Interfax cites and which also mentions the obligations taken for members of parliament to report on the gifts received.

GRECO indicated that the income declarations of parliamentarians did not take into account information about dividends that members of the legislative branch of government could receive. GRECO also considers it necessary to strengthen the transparency of the legislative process in the Russian Federation, indicating that public hearings in the preparation of bills should become systematic.

The Panel criticised the possibility for the executive to independently initiate the filing of MPs' income returns, which GRECO said "remains a matter of concern in terms of the principle of separation of powers."

As for combating corruption in the judicial sphere, GRECO noted Russia's implementation of a number of recommendations and recalled anti-corruption initiatives in recruiting the judicial corps and its professional training.

GRECO also announced the success of the Russian authorities in improving the work of the prosecutor's office: for example, the procedure for recruiting the prosecutor's office became more transparent, practical recommendations were developed for giving a report on receiving gifts, including in non-monetary form, from third parties; in professional training, more systematic attention is paid to anti-corruption issues. But at the same time, GRECO called for increased openness in the event of disciplinary sanctions against members of the Prokur corps and a number of other measures to be taken to save lawsuits from potential "improper influence."

In conclusion, GRECO indicated that Russia needs to demonstrate more efforts in the next 18 months to achieve an "acceptable level of compliance." The Group also proposed the Russian Federation by June 30, 2021 to provide additional information regarding the implementation of these recommendations.

PFR in 2019 received 338.6 million rubles. confiscated corruption funds

The Government of the Russian Federation submitted in May 2020 to the State Duma a report on the execution of the budgets of the Pension Fund (PFR), the Compulsory Social Insurance Fund (FSS) and the Compulsory Health Insurance Fund (MHIF) for 2019. According to the document, the receipt of confiscated funds received as a result of corruption offenses to the PFR budget amounted^[15] 338.6^[16] rubles^[17].

According to the PFR budget execution report (N962479-7), in 2019, the proceeds of confiscated funds received as a result of committing corruption offenses amounted to 338 million 639.7 thousand rubles.

On January 1, 2019, a law came into force, according to which confiscated funds obtained as a result of the disclosure of corruption crimes, as well as funds from the sale of confiscated property obtained as a result of committing corruption offenses, should be sent to the fund. The forecast volume of revenues in 2019-2024 is 1.8 billion rubles.

Former head of Beltelecom confessed to bribes of hundreds of thousands of dollars

On March 10, 2020, the Supreme Court of Belarus began to consider a criminal case on the numerous facts of receiving and paying bribes during the supply of telecommunication equipment, computer equipment and software to the republic against 16 persons. Among them is the former general of Beltelecom Sergey Sivodedov. He confessed to receiving more than $470 thousand and 15 thousand euros in bribes from 2013 to 2019. Read more here.

The creator of the Telegram channel in Russia was detained for extorting 800 thousand rubles from an official

On February 13, 2020, it became known about the detention of blogger Dmitry Sviridov on suspicion of extorting money from a representative of the administration of the city of Korolev near Moscow. According to the REN TV channel, Sviridov was detained in a Moscow cafe as part of an operational-search event.

According to TASS, the Russian Information Agency, citing a law enforcement source, the suspect is Dmitry Sviridov, the author of the Demon Channel Telegram channel. According to the agency, he demanded money from deputy head Korolyov Ilya Konyshev for refusing to publish compromising evidence on the head of the city, Alexander Khodyrev.

According to the press service of the Moscow Region Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the suspect demanded 800 thousand rubles from the head of the Korolev city district. Otherwise, he threatened to publish some incriminating evidence. When transferring money, the man was detained by employees of the regional FSB department.

Police investigators opened a criminal case under Article 163 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation "Extortion." The suspect has been placed under house arrest.

By mid-February 2020, a little more than a thousand people signed up for the Demon Channel. Sviridov has already published critical posts about Korolev's officials there several times. In one of the latter, he said that he was going to meet with the city hall for "a direct and frank conversation without censorship and standard excuses." It is not known whether compromising evidence for 800,000 rubles will now appear on the channel, since in addition to house arrest, Sviridov was banned from the Internet.

For an attempt to make money on his journalistic investigations, the blogger faces from four to 15 years in prison.

A similar case occurred in 2018 in Sochi. Editor-in-chief of the local Internet platform "Blog. Sochi "Alexander Valov extorted 250,000 rubles from State Duma deputy Yuri Napso for not publishing information that discredits his reputation.^[18]

Rostelecom received a Certificate of public confirmation of compliance with the provisions of the Anti-Corruption Charter of Russian Business

On January 31, 2020, Rostelecom announced the completion of the Public Confirmation Procedure for the Implementation of the Provisions of the Anti-Corruption Charter of Russian Business with the highest rating - 5 points out of 5 possible. Rostelecom received a Certificate of Public Confirmation of Compliance with the Provisions of the Anti-Corruption Charter of Russian Business, which exempts the company from the need to submit a declaration of compliance with the provisions of the charter within five years after its receipt.

The President RUIE Alexander Shokhin noted the excellent assessment that Rostelecom received following a comprehensive audit. Now the company can count on high-class assignment in the first national anti-corruption rating of Russian business, which begins to be formed by the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs among the largest companies from 2020 on the basis of Russian and international standards of anti-corruption management.

The audit was carried out on 183 indicators by highly qualified specialized experts of the NP Center for the Development of Corporate Relations and the Resolution of Economic Disputes, accredited by the Joint Committee for the Implementation of the Anti-Corruption Charter of Russian Business as an authorized expert center.

Rostelecom joined the Anti-Corruption Charter of Russian Business in 2014 to implement measures in its activities to prevent and combat corruption and create conditions for public condemnation and rejection of corruption manifestations when interacting with state officials, business partners and other persons.

The essence of the anti-corruption charter is the commitment of its participants to high standards of doing business and the introduction of special anti-corruption programs and practices that relate not only to situations within the company, but also to relations with business partners and the state. The charter provides for the rejection of preferences, procurement on the basis of open bidding, financial control, training and work with personnel, assistance to law enforcement agencies and other measures.

The head of the Accounts Chamber assessed the damage from corruption in Russia

Damage from corruption in Russia can be measured in trillions of rubles. This assessment was given in an interview with RIA Novosti by the head of the Accounts Chamber Alexei Kudrin.

Moreover, the most serious damage is not direct, but indirect, Kudrin believes. "The question is not just that someone gave a kickback or received some amount illegally. He did it for some purpose: to get a subsidy, a contract or a license, or not to get someone else. That is, corruption distorts incentives in the economy, and so we lose the pace of economic growth, and with them the growth of household incomes, investments, etc., "he explained.

The head of the Accounts Chamber separately touched upon the negative role of state corporations. "Including when state corporations by administrative methods change the situation on the market, receive some advantages, it can be assumed that the corruption component is also present there," said Alexei Kudrin.

Earlier it was reported that the Accounts Chamber discovered serious violations in the work of the state-owned company Avtodor when checking its activities in 2018. As stated in the report of the state auditor, "facts of overestimation of the cost of accepted and paid work, as well as the ineffective use of resources created at the expense of the federal budget" were revealed. The total damage to the state, according to the Accounts Chamber, slightly exceeded 7 billion rubles.

2019

Service for business complaints about security forces pressure launched in Russia

In November 2019, a Russia service was launched for business complaints about pressure from law enforcement agencies. The platform "" ЗаБизнес.рф accepts the appeal to,,, and State Office of Public Prosecutor Investigative Committee. MINISTRY OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS FSB More. here

Russia dropped three places in the ranking of perception of corruption

According to the results of 2018, Russia took 138th place in the Transparency International corruption perception rating. The ^[19][20].

Over the year, the Russian Federation lost three positions in the ranking. Russia shares 138 places with Guinea, Iran, Lebanon, Mexico and Papua New Guinea.

The corruption perception index in Russia is 28 points out of 100 (the maximum score means the minimum level of perception of corruption). Compared to last year, it was down by one point.

Problems with corruption in the Russian Federation, says Transparency International - Russia, are due to the fact that "the current institutions of a democratic society are often replaced by their imitation."

In total, 180 countries were included in the rating. The first place is occupied by Denmark.

2018

The Russian authorities are going to make "anti-money laundering compliance" mandatory for all companies

In November 2018, it became known that Rosfinmonitoring proposes to oblige a legal entity to take measures within its companies to prevent the legalization of proceeds from crime, and to fine and confiscate property for making transactions involving such income or property.

The Law "On Countering the Legalization of Criminal Proceeds and Financing of Terrorism" is proposed to be supplemented with an article establishing that legal entities and their governing bodies, including those controlling its financial and economic activities, are obliged to take measures to prevent the legal entity from committing transactions or financial transactions with funds or other property knowingly acquired by criminal means. This was reported to Interfax by a source familiar with the discussion of the document.

Such measures may include cooperation with law enforcement agencies and Rosfinmonitoring, the introduction of procedures that would establish the integrity of counterparties, as well as ensuring compliance with the requirements of anti-money laundering legislation and informing employees about the measures taken by the legal entity to prevent their involvement in money laundering.

If transactions or financial transactions with cash or other property knowingly acquired by criminal means were carried out in the interests or on behalf of a legal entity, liability measures may be applied to it.

At the same time, liability measures can be applied to legal entities registered under the legislation of a foreign state, as well as to their branches and representative offices, foreign structures without forming a legal entity, if they have committed an offense outside the Russian Federation, but if their act is directed against the interests of the Russian Federation.

If adopted, the law may enter into force 30 days after the day of its official publication.

But it is possible to soften

The Ministry of Economic Development supported the proposal of Rosfinmonitoring. However, the ministry proposed to soften the article on the obligation of legal entities to carry out warning measures in order to avoid unreasonably high requirements for the standard of their discretion, for recognition as bona fide. According to the ministry, it is necessary to clarify that legal entities are obliged to take "reasonable and accessible in the current circumstances" measures.

Proposed punishment

The Code of Administrative Offenses is proposed to be supplemented with the article "Making transactions or financial transactions with property acquired by criminal means in the interests of a legal entity." In it, in relation to legal entities, in the interests or on behalf of which a transaction or finoperation was carried out with money or property, acquired knowingly for the perpetrator by criminal means, a fine of up to three times the amount of money or the value of other property is provided, the subject of an administrative offense, but at least 1 million rubles, or suspension of activities for up to 9 days with confiscation.

At the same time, it is specified that a legal entity is found guilty if an offense on his behalf was committed by an authorized person on the basis of a law, legal act, charter, contract or power of attorney; and also if the act is committed deliberately in the interests of a legal entity by a person holding a position in its governing bodies or bodies exercising control over its financial and economic activities.

Money and property that is the subject of an offence, as well as any proceeds from transactions or financial transactions with that property, are subject to confiscation, except for property that is returned to the owner as compensation for damage caused.

Anti-Corruption Information System

In the summer of 2018, the President Russia Vladimir Putin signed a decree on the implementation of the "National Anti-Corruption Plan for 2018-2020." Some provisions of the plan instruct various departments to resort to IT help in the fight against corruption among civil servants^[21]

In particular, we are talking about ensuring the completeness and transparency of information on the income and property of officials in order to identify such property, the acquisition of which for legal income has not been confirmed, and turn it into state income. To improve this mechanism, the Russian Security Service with the participation of the Presidential Administration (AP), the government and interested government agencies was ordered to consider the possibility of creating and introducing a special information system.

Through this system, the interaction of these bodies in the fight against corruption will be carried out. The system will be implemented in the AP and other government agencies. It will be created on the basis of the anti-corruption system, which is already used in the AP. A report on the implementation of this paragraph of the decree must be provided by October 1, 2018.

Measures in the field of public procurement and business

The decree also provides for the use of IT to counter corruption in the field of public procurement. According to one of the paragraphs, the government should consider giving the Prosecutor General's Office the authority to maintain a register of legal entities brought to justice 19.28 of the Administrative Code of Russia. The article provides for the punishment of officials for receiving illegal remuneration from legal entities.

The Prosecutor General's Office will have to determine what information should be included in this register and in what order they will be placed in the unified information system in the field of procurement. A report on the implementation of this paragraph of the decree must be provided by December 1, 2018.

In addition, the decree instructs the government to consider creating conditions under which the customer can learn in time about a possible conflict of interest in the implementation of public procurement, including through information interaction between departments. A report on the implementation of this item must be submitted by July 1, 2019.

An online register of officials dismissed for corruption will appear in Russia

An online register of persons dismissed from their posts due to loss of confidence due to involvement in corruption will appear in Russia. The corresponding government decree No. 228 was signed and published on the official Internet portal of legal^[22].

According to the decree, the register will be in the public domain on the official website of the Unified Information System for Managing Personnel of the State Civil Service of Russia at gossluzhba.gov.ru/reestr. The document will be presented in PDF format. The Department of Civil Service and Personnel of the Government of Russia will be responsible for its conduct.

The creation of the said register provides for the law "On amendments to certain legislative acts of the Russian Federation in terms of posting in the state information system in the field of public service information on the application of penalties in the form of dismissal due to loss of confidence for committing corruption offenses," which was signed by the President of Russia in July 2017.

The title of the law emphasizes that we are talking about the loss of confidence in connection with corruption. The bill was prepared by the Ministry of Labor, its first version was posted on the regulation.gov.ru portal in January 2015.

2017

The Prosecutor General's Office revealed the most corrupt unit of security officials

Most of the crimes in the field of corruption in the Russian law enforcement system in 2017 were committed by police officers. Such data were provided by the First Deputy Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Alexander Buksman. He was quoted by RIA Novosti by the^[23] of ^[24].

Of the 1.3 thousand law enforcement officers convicted of corruption, 729 worked in the internal affairs bodies, Buksman emphasized.

Employees of the Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) committed 191 such crimes, 174 - employees of the bailiff service. 70 similar offenses belong to the customs authorities, and 57 to the Russian Guard.

According to the first deputy prosecutor general, the number of corruption crimes committed by law enforcement officers is only growing every year.

Despite the measures taken by law enforcement agencies aimed at countering corruption in their own ranks, for two months of this year, about 1.3 thousand law enforcement officers who committed corruption crimes were established - Alexander Buksman.

At the same time, the total number of crimes in this area, on the contrary, is decreasing.

Even isolated cases of corruption in the system can cross out all the efforts made by law enforcement officers, Buksman said. They also negatively affect the trust in this work in the eyes of the population.

Since 2014, corrupt officials in Russia have managed to "earn" about 150 billion rubles. Over a three-year period, 122 thousand crimes in this area were registered in the country, and 45 thousand people were convicted.

Public list of individuals dismissed due to loss of trust

The country's Prosecutor General Yury Chaika made a proposal in December 2017 to create a public list of persons dismissed in connection with the loss of confidence. According to the Kommersant newspaper, the initiative will enter into force on January 1, 2018. As Yury Chaika notes, in 2016, 400 officials were dismissed under this article, for 9 months of 2017, 2.3 times more - 926 people.

According to the Prosecutor General, gross corruption offenses may become the basis for applying this type of responsibility. This, for example, hiding information about income and property or non-compliance with anti-corruption bans.

2017

Unified database on property and accounts of Russians

Chairman of the Investigative Committee of Russia Alexander Bastrykin proposed in December 2017 to create unified databases on property and accounts that would quickly determine the property of suspects in criminal activities.

Main article: Unified database on property and accounts of Russians

It will be possible to report corruption colleagues confidentially

On February 8, the Ministry of Labor of the Russian Federation issued^[25]) for public discussion, a bill introducing new measures to protect such citizens. According to the document, a separate article "Reports on corruption offenses and measures to protect reporting persons" should appear in law No. 273-FZ.

The article directly obliges not only law enforcement agencies, but also the employer to respond to reports of corruption. In addition, it introduces protection not only for those who reported corruption, but also for those who help solve corruption crimes in other ways. For example, it provides the investigation with additional information or reveals the whereabouts of a person wanted for corruption crimes.

The main measure of protection that the bill introduces is privacy. After all, it is the concealment of the name of the informant that guarantees him the complete absence of any persecution and even oblique views. True, it is worth noting that in some cases it will be quite difficult to maintain confidentiality. If we are talking about a small team, or if very few knew about the crime, it will not be difficult to calculate whistleblower. For this case, all other protective measures are needed.

The bill guarantees whistleblowers free legal aid. This applies not only to the preparation of appeals, as in law No. 324-FZ, but in general any problems associated with reporting corruption. Finally, the bill spelled out the right of informants to be protected from unlawful dismissal and infringements in the field of labor regulations and remuneration. Within three years after reporting the fact of corruption, the informant can be dismissed or transferred to another position at the initiative of the employer only following a meeting of the certification commission. During the meeting, the employer will have to prove that personnel changes are not related to reporting corruption. The minutes of the meeting are provided to the prosecutor.

At the same time, the bill especially notes that these protection measures do not apply to persons who reported deliberately false information. On the contrary, they themselves face responsibility for slander or deliberately false denunciation. So office intrigues will not be able to protect themselves from official troubles by stipulating colleagues.

Polygraph ensures reduction of corruption risks during procurement in Moscow

Polygraph testing has become an effective tool for countering and preventing the emergence of corruption risks in Moscow. More than six thousand civil servants have been tested since 2011. This was announced at the beginning of the year by the head of the Moscow City Department for Competitive Policy Gennady Dogtev.

In 2017, 1.7 thousand civil servants will have to undergo a lie detector test.

"Almost 90 percent reached the share of employees who, following the results of inspections, fell into the" green "zone, excluding the possibility of corruption risks. In 2012, this figure did not exceed 55 percent. Thus, the positive dynamics of risk factor reduction is obvious. Checks using a polygraph or speech analyzer K-Factor become one of the effective tools to counter corruption in the field of procurement among employees employed, including in the field of urban procurement, "said G. Dogtev

.

More than 1.7 thousand employees Moscow were tested using a polygraph and a K-Factor analyzer in 2016, said Dogtev.

"70 percent of the 1.7 thousand employees tested work in the city procurement system. According to the results of inspections, only two percent of the examined revealed corruption risk factors. A year earlier, this figure was six percent, "the head of the department emphasized. Not a single head or specialist of the contract service and a member of the commission can be included in the Register of public civil servants employed in the field of procurement without undergoing a polygraph procedure, G. Dogtev said.

"The effect of the use of a polygraph was appreciated by the leaders of many government agencies in Moscow, who implemented the inclusion of polygraph checks in the program for the prevention of corruption in the field of procurement. The range of categories of employees subject to mandatory polygraph testing can be expanded. Since since January 1, 2017, 70 state unitary enterprises and state-owned enterprises in Moscow have transferred their procurement activities to the regulation of the Law on the Contract System, we recommend that managers make the polygraph test procedure mandatory for contract service employees. Along with this, it would be advisable to conduct polygraph tests for those who are related to the sale of property through the Unified Trading Platform of Moscow, "G. Dogtev emphasized

.

Since 2016, the capital has introduced uniform requirements for bidding in relation to property located in the property treasury of the city of Moscow, enshrined in the right of economic management or operational management of unitary enterprises and institutions of the city of Moscow. Now all auctions for the sale and lease of real estate will be held on the Unified Trading Platform of the city of Moscow.

The effects of the use of a polygraph were also assessed by commercial structures, said Natalia Tkacheva, head of the psychophysiological research department of the Service Center 44 GBU.

"Representatives of commercial companies are increasingly seeking help in conducting polygraph tests. Those who have repeatedly been tested on a polygraph are calmer about each next test, realizing that a competent polygraph specialist will be able to distinguish understandable excitement from the manifestations of risk factors, "N. Tkacheva noted.

2016

Main trends:

• Increase in the share of "sophisticated" schemes
• Rising proportion of crimes at board level
• Reducing the proportion of randomly detected crimes
• Shorten average detection time
• Drift of emphasis from response to warning

Russia began to kill and take bribes less

In 2016, compared to 2015, the number of detected economic crimes decreased by 3.3% in the country. The number of reported cases of receiving bribes decreased by 17.7%.

2016

Russian schoolchildren will be vaccinated with "anti-corruption standards of behavior"

The Russian Ministry of Education and Science submitted a new version of the secondary school educational standard for public discussion in December, in which there was a requirement to create an "anti-corruption worldview" among students.

Schoolchildren will have to study anti-corruption within the framework of the "Law" section of the subject "Social Sciences." In addition to the foundations of legal thinking, the subject will have to lay down "anti-corruption standards of behavior."

In the clause on the formation of the personal qualities of the student, the ministry proposed adding "the ability to resist the ideology of extremism, nationalism, xenophobia, discrimination on social, religious, racial, national signs and other negative social phenomena."

The proposed changes also refine the content of the mathematics course and describe astronomy as an independent subject outside of physics.

The proposed changes to the educational standard are part of the Anti-Corruption Education Program^[26], which was approved in 2014. Moreover, the approval of the new standards was to take place before the end of 2015, and a year later the Ministry of Education and Science was required to show the first monitoring results.

For 9 months of 2016, there were 24,766 criminal cases of corruption crimes in the proceedings of the TFR

In December 2016, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation (TFR) reported^[27]That in the first nine months of 2016, 24.8 thousand criminal corruption cases were in the proceedings^[28] its investigators (about five thousand cases remained unexplored since last year). In 2015, there were a little more of them - 25.3 thousand. Judging by the published data, in 2016, as before, most often the reason for initiating a case was the giving and receiving of bribes, fraud, embezzlement and abuse of office^[29].

Investigators of the TFR emphasize that among the defendants in corruption cases there are not only officials, but also persons with a special legal status. In 2016, cases were sent to the courts against 427 such persons, these are employees of the internal affairs bodies, Gosnarkokontrol, prosecutors, lawyers, judges, employees of the TFR itself, as well as: 56 members of election commissions, 130 deputies of local self-government bodies, 116 heads of municipalities, 13 deputies of legislative bodies.

Among those accused of corruption are high-ranking former officials: governors of the Sakhalin Region Alexander Khoroshavin and the Kirov Region Nikita Belykh, head of the Komi Republic Vyacheslav Gaiser, Minister of Economic Development Alexei Ulyukaev, Vice Governor of St. Petersburg Marat Hovhannisyan and Deputy Governor of the Chelyabinsk Region Nikolai Sandakov, Mayor of Pereslavl-Zalessky Denis Koshurnikov. The cases of a high-ranking employee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Dmitry Zakharchenko and the director of the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia Alexander Reimer are being investigated.

Detailed statistics on corruption crimes in the context of regions can be found on the website "Portal of Legal Statistics," it is supervised by the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation:

According to the portal, from January to October 2016, 5570 cases of bribes were registered in Russia. The leader in this area was Moscow (249 such crimes). The second place is taken by the Krasnodar Territory (216 cases), the third - the Trans-Baikal Territory (207). The list is followed by the Rostov Region, Tatarstan, Bashkiria, Volgograd Region, Voronezh Region, Chelyabinsk Region and Altai Territory. At the same time, not a single case of receiving a bribe was recorded in the Jewish Autonomous Region and in the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug for the year. Isolated cases of bribery were identified in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Murmansk Region, Ingushetia, Yakutia, Kamchatka Territory, Tambov Region, Karachay-Cherkessia, Kalmykia and the Republic of Tuva, Karelia and Sevastopol.

Cases of bribes during the same time were recorded slightly less - 4593. The leader in this type of crime was the Volgograd Region (221 cases), followed again by Moscow (191), Moscow Region (179), Tatarstan, Sverdlovsk Region, Perm Territory, Rostov Region, Stavropol Territory and St. Petersburg. And again: not a single case of bribery was registered in the Chukotka Autonomous Region. Isolated cases of bribes were found in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Karachay-Cherkessia, Kabardino-Balkaria and North Ossetia, Kamchatka Territory and the Republic of Khakassia, in the Republic of Tuva, Ingushetia and the Jewish Autonomous Region.

Crimes related to abuse of office were registered 2037. Most of them were detected in Tatarstan (205 cases). This is followed by the Vologda region (100), Krasnodar Territory (98), the Republic of Crimea (65) and Moscow (61), Chelyabinsk Region, Perm Territory, Dagestan, Bashkiria and the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug. And on the contrary, such crimes are rarely detected in the Republic of Altai, Smolensk, Yaroslavl and Kaliningrad regions, in the Altai Territory, Tuva and the Pskov region. In the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Khakassia, the Oryol Region, the Magadan Region and the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, only one case of abuse of power was recorded.

Quite a lot of detected corruption crimes at the same time remain unsolved. According to the Portal of Legal Statistics, as of October 2016, 106 cases of bribery and 79 cases of bribery were listed as undisclosed; 78 cases of abuse of authority are considered unsolved, of which 18 are in the Republic of Crimea and 8 in Sevastopol.

In the near future, the concept of corruption can be significantly expanded. The TFR again recalled that the department has prepared a number of bills related to combating corruption, and in particular abuses in privatization and the withdrawal of capital abroad to avoid taxes. The head of the TFR, Alexander Bastrykin, has repeatedly said that he considers it necessary to restore confiscation of property in the Criminal Code as an additional punishment for mercenary crimes, the corresponding bill is also pending consideration in the Duma (today confiscation is a measure of a criminal law nature, property, money and valuables that were received or used to commit a crime can be confiscated).

In the meantime, according to the TFR, the cost of the arrested property of those accused of corruption crimes is only seven billion rubles, and the defendants in the investigations compensated for the damage in the amount of about three billion rubles. For comparison: according to the estimates of the Prosecutor General's Office, material damage from corruption crimes in 2015 amounted to 43 billion rubles, and in the first half of this year - about 28.5 billion rubles.

In the world

Anti-corruption legislation and best practice

The need to protect persons reporting corruption crimes is provided for by the UN Convention against Corruption. The convention was adopted in New York in 2003, and Russia ratified it in 2006^[30].

The system of protection of the so-called "whistleblowers" (whistleblowers, "blowing the whistle") is developed in many countries, but primarily in the United States. There, the special government organization Government Accountability Project is engaged in defending their interests. The first whistleblower is traditionally considered Benjamin Franklin, who in 1773 published confidential letters. So it was proved that the Governor of Massachusetts misled the UK Parliament and achieved military buildup in the New World. It is worth noting that whistleblower refers to ordinary citizens who accidentally became aware of a violation of the law, and not full-time law enforcement informants.

• The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision’s (Basel I, Basel II)
• COSO (The Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission)
• Specification for an anti-bribery management system (ABMS)
• Recommendations from leading auditors (KPMG, Ernst & Young, Delloite, PriceWaterCoopers House)
• UN Convention and Analyst UNIDC (UN Drug and Crime Units)
• UK Bribery Act 2010
• Methodological Recommendations on the Development and Adoption of Measures by Organizations to Prevent and Combat Corruption, Ministry of Labor of 08.11.2013
• Decree of the President of the Russian Federation No. 147 of April 1, 2016 "On the National Anti-Corruption Plan for 2016-2017"

Stages of anti-corruption activities:

• Prevention
• Identification
• Reaction

The main measures taken in the largest companies and provided for by the state by the politicians of the leading countries:

• Education and training
• Hotlines and alarm buttons
• Analytical apparatus
• Regulatory framework

Principles of effective operation of the Hotline:

• Knowledge
• Availability
• Privacy
• Anonymity
• Whistleblower protection
• Option - Reward for Information

Problems of anti-corruption measures

• Pretentiousness
• Inertia, focus on next generation
• Bureaucratization trend
• "The Problem of the 20th Article"
• Superiority of response over warning (including at the level of algorithms)
• Belovorotnichka mafia

2023: China begins operation to catch corrupt officials who fled abroad

On March 21, 2023, the Information Department of the State Council of China (SCIO) announced that the country's authorities had initiated a large-scale anti-corruption operation codenamed Sky Net. Read more here.

2020

Charging Apple's security chief with bribery

On November 23, 2020, Apple security chief Thomas Moyer was accused of trying to bribe police officers with iPads. Details of the charge are cited by the Santa Clara district attorney's office. Read more here.

Ministry in Denmark told how blockchain will defeat corruption

In early September 2020, the Danish Ministry of Development Cooperation published a report recognizing blockchain as an effective tool to combat corruption, especially in refugee camps. Blockchain provides increased oversight of businesses, governments and stakeholders, thereby cutting many corrupt ties. Read more here.

2019

How Ericsson bribed officials around the world and will now pay $1 billion

In early December 2019, the exact amount that Ericsson will pay to withdraw corruption charges that were previously brought by the US Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) became known. Under the terms of the agreement, Ericsson will pay $520.6 million in favor of the Ministry of Justice, $458.4 million from the SEC, as well as $81.5 million in interest for a pre-trial settlement.

In the world, only 13% of organizations use AI and machine learning to combat fraud

On July 11, 2019, it became known that in just two years artificial intelligence and machine learning will be used to counter fraud three times more often than in July 2019. Such data were obtained during a joint study by SAS and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE). As of July 2019, such anti-fraud tools are already used by 13% of organizations that took part in the survey, and another 25% said they plan to implement them within the next year or two.

As reported, the joint SAS and ACFE study was launched in February 2019, and its results were summed up at the end of June 2019. To do this, the responses of 1,055 ACFE members working in different countries of the world were studied. Based on the results, an interactive report was created. The questions asked to the experts concerned the technologies and tools that are used in their organizations to combat fraud.

As it turned out, as of July 2019, most organizations most often use predefined reports on key fraud events using classic tools, for example, from Microsoft Office. It is the standard tool for 64% of companies covered by the study. In the second most popular place, automatic monitoring using expert business rules is used in 54% of organizations. Closes the top three visual data research using BI tools - it accounts for 35%.

As for the plans for the development of the technologies used, in addition to the growing interest in AI, the authors of the study revealed the following trends:

• Wider adoption of biometrics is expected. As of July 2019, approximately one in four organizations use it, and another 16% of survey participants plan to implement it by 2021.
• It is planned to significantly pay more attention to various tools and techniques of data analysis. It is expected that by 2021, 72% of organizations will use automatic data monitoring, automatic detection of anomalies, etc., to combat fraud.
• Predictive analytics is planned to be used in 52% of organizations, which is 22% higher than the previous study.
• An increasing trend continues for the use of data visualization tools - 47% of organizations plan to use or continue to use them (as of July 2019, 35% are trying on).

One of the questions asked to participants concerned the most commonly used analytical tools. It turned out that SAS solutions are most often chosen for solving predictive analytics and modeling problems, for analyzing social relationships and applying graph analytics, for deep analysis of text information.

Since attackers use modern technologies, using them to build increasingly advanced criminal schemes, professionals who oppose them must also resort to the most advanced solutions. The answer to the question of who will emerge victorious from this confrontation depends on the choice of the most effective technologies and risk management tools. narrated by Bruce Dorries, President and CEO of ACFE

China shuts down artificial intelligence that sought corrupt officials too effectively

Authorities China are disabling the Zero Trust computer system, built on artificial intelligence and designed to combat corruption among officials. It was developed and deployed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and internal oversight bodies of the Chinese Communist Party. The system is designed to monitor, evaluate, and, if necessary, interfere with the work and personal lives of civil servants^[31]

Some regional governments, including Manyang Autonomous District, Huaihua Urban District, and Li County in Hunan Province, stopped the Zero Trust from operating on their territory, citing the fact that civil servants did not feel comfortable during its use. In some departments - such as the Chinese Communist Party Discipline Review Commission in Ningxiang - the system is still in use, yet officials admit to being under immense pressure. There is no talk of a nationwide Zero Trust launch.

Many officials, seeking to ban the system, pointed out as a reason the fact that artificial intelligence does not have the right to access classified databases - this issue is not regulated by Chinese law.

2017

UN named the annual volume of bribes in the world

Every year, the world spends $1 trillion on bribes. This is stated in the message of the United Nations (UN), published in honor of the International Day against Corruption, which was celebrated on December 9, 2017.

As a result of corruption, states receive $2.6 trillion, an amount equivalent to 5% of world GDP. According to the UN Development Program, in developing countries, corruption-related losses exceed official development assistance by ten times.

"The UN

reminds that bribery is a serious crime that undermines the socio-economic development of any society. No country, no region is immune from corruption, "the international organization said in a statement. "These figures are staggering, but even more surprising, what lies behind these financial frauds - a world of terrible poverty and inequality, exacerbated by distortions in income distribution and decisions on public spending influenced by corruption," said Patrick Kewlers, head of the UNDP peacebuilding support department.

He mentioned the investigations of the Panama archives and stressed that these materials of journalists showed the scale of all the hidden world wealth that is hidden offshore. He also refers to data from analysts at Oxfam International, which estimated that African states lose about $14 billion annually due to tax evasion. Keulers points out that this money could go to health care to save the lives of 4 million children, or to education so that every child in African countries can study at school.

The 2017 barometer of global corruption in the Asia-Pacific region, which was released by Transparency International in November, shows that 38% of people living below the poverty line are forced to pay bribes for access to public services. The authors of the study also concluded that a high level of bribes is associated with a low level of literacy among young people.

British authorities use artificial intelligence to uncover corruption

In February 2017, it became known about the use of the Ravn ACE system by the British authorities to investigate corruption. The technology was tested on British aircraft engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce.

The UK's Large Scale Fraud Office (SFO) pioneered the use of an automated Ravn ACE system designed to select and index documents and extract knowledge from them. Using the program, seven specialists processed 600 thousand documents a day. In total, about 30 million materials were analyzed in automatic mode. Previously, such information had to be processed manually. See Ravn ACE for more details.

2016

Transparency International - Corruption Perceptions Index

The annual Corruption Perception Index study was published by Transparency International^[32]. The ranking, which includes 176 countries, gives an assessment of the level of corruption in each of the states. The less points the country scored, the higher its level of perception of corruption.

Azerbaijan took the best position in the Caspian region. The country has 123 places with 30 points (in 2015 - 29 points).

Russia, together with Kazakhstan and Iran, received 29 points each in 2016. All these countries took 131 places. And if Russia's position has not changed over the year, then Kazakhstan and Iran have grown slightly - from 28 and 27 points, respectively.

Turkmenistan in the ranking scored 22 points and took 154 place. Despite the rather low position, the country made a noticeable leap, improving its performance by three points. So, last year Turkmenistan scored only 18 points.

New Zealand and Denmark shared 1st place. These countries have 90 points each. The "tail" of the rating is the DPRK (12 points), Sudan (11 points) and Somalia (10 points).

The average value of the level of perception of corruption in the world is 43 points.

In general, the compilers of the rating note that there have been no significant changes in the attitude towards corruption over the past year - neither in Central Asia nor in Europe.

1200 Kazakh officials are deprived of the right to work in public service for life

Most of them are for corruption crimes.

This was announced by the Deputy Chairman of the Agency of Kazakhstan for Civil Service Affairs and Anti-Corruption Alik Shpekbaev, Kazinform MIA reports in December 2016. In the last two years alone, 660 officials have been sentenced to multiple fines. Thanks to this, the budget received more than 6 billion tenge. 924 officials attracted for corruption crimes were confiscated, and more than 1200 were deprived of the lifelong right to work in public service, Shpekbaev said.

By the way, in the outgoing year, the Ethics Commissioners, disciplinary commissions in government agencies and ethics councils in the regions appeared in Kazakhstan. They follow the moral and ethical appearance of civil servants. In case of non-compliance with the standards, these bodies give appropriate advice and instructions. In extreme case, disciplinary liability is provided, up to dismissal from the civil service.

2014

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC)

Deloitte: What time are the risks of fraud assessed?

• On average, each organization loses 5% of revenue per year from fraudulent activities;
• About one third of cases of fraud occur in the field of corruption, the average loss under one scheme is $250,000;
• The higher the level of power of the fraudster, the greater the losses. Average fraud losses arising from abuse of ownership/senior management are estimated at $573,000 committed by management - $180,000 and committed by employees - $60,000.

The average amount of direct financial damage from fraud in the Russian Federation is about 5 times higher than around the world

2013: KPMG

• About one in seven scams are revealed completely by accident (13%);
• Every tenth crime is solved thanks to the information of company employees for remuneration;
• 14% of frauds were disclosed with the help of anonymous informants;
• 8% of crimes were solved after complaints from customers and suppliers were received;
• 6% were cases where violations were identified as a result of requests from controlling organizations, banks, tax authorities, competitors or investors.

Bribes and fraud in medicine

Main article: Crimes in medicine

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See also

• Crime in Russia
• Unified database on property and accounts of Russians
• Information Security - Fraud Detection System (Fraud)
• Credit fraud
• Money Laundering (Money Muling)

• Based on the presentation "Comprehensive automation of anti-corruption activities. Theory and practice. " Natalia Petukhova and Alexey Bogdanov, Compulink, 2016
• Corruption in Russia: classification and dynamics

Notes