site.btaRevenue Agency Hacking Suspect Searched for Data on Prime Minister and Prosecutor General

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Revenue Agency Hacking Suspect
Searched for Data on Prime Minister
and Prosecutor General


Sofia, July 23 (BTA) - Three days before a July 15 massive leak of National Revenue Agency (NRA) data, the office computer of the suspect in the hacking attack, Kristian Boikov, was used to make searches in the NRA database by entering the personal identification numbers (EGNs) of Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, Prosecutor General Sotir Tsatsarov and MP Delyan Peevski. Shortly before that, similar searches were also conducted for two other persons and for the Aviora Consult law firm. The news was reported in a press release by the prosecution service on Tuesday, following statements by Boikov and his employers.

The results of the computer searches were saved in a file named "Search for Bivol." Bivol is a well-known investigative journalism website. Afterwards, the EGN of MEP Emil Radev was also used in a search from Boikov's computer into the NRA database. Boikov shared the search results with another person.

Boikov, a 20-year-old employee of a Sofia-based cybersecurity company, was arrested for the NRA data breach but was released on July 18 after NRA apparently told the investigators that the hacked information system was not considered critical infrastructure. Boikov denies any involvement and his employer suspects that he has been framed by rivals in order to harm ongoing projects of his company. He, however, remains a suspect.

In its press release on Tuesday, the prosecution service also said that Boikov replaced the original date of the computer files with the date 10.11.1989, which is the same as the date of the files leaked online. The investigation against Boikov has yielded files which are identical with some of the leaked ones.

The evidence collected so far does not run counter to the reasonable assumption that Boikov committed the computer crime which he is charged with, the prosecution service said. The prosecutors' conclusion is that Boikov had access to the NRA data before it was leaked on July 15, when emails containing links to the database were sent to some media. The prosecution service continues to decrypt the information on Boikov's computer and to analyze the information already decrypted.

Meanwhile, Deputy Prosecutor General Ivan Geshev told Bulgarian National Television that Boikov is obviously a mere tool in the hands of his superiors, and the company he is working at is engaged in cyber racketeering.

The computers which the authorities have seized from Boikov's office and home have the best software protection, Geshev noted. It took the investigators 10 days to access one of the office computers. It was found to contain information from 106 databases identical with ones in the NRA information system. Some of them are the original copies of the files leaked to the media on July 15. The rest must have been intended to be released later.

Discussing the searches conducted via Boikov's computer, Geshev said: "There were all sorts of other searches, too. One of them was about people in a cancer clinic in Bourgas. There is a staggering amount of data which we are yet to go through." Attempts have also been made to breach databases of insurance companies and various commercial corporations.

Geshev, who has been nominated for Prosecutor General, ventured the theory that Boikov's company "simply combines cyber racketeering, which is probably its main line of business, and political interests." LY/VE
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