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Belarus-Backed Espionage Plot Foiled by Ukraine’s Security Service
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![Photo of Dariia Mykhailenko]( "Photo of Dariia Mykhailenko")
Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) has disrupted a covert operation by Belarusian intelligence aimed at gathering sensitive military data along the country’s northern border.
According to the SBU on July 28, a 24-year-old man from the Volyn region was recruited by the Belarusian KGB via anonymous Telegram channels. Unemployed and seeking quick money, he agreed to spy on Ukrainian Armed Forces positions in the border area.
His mission involved tracking military checkpoints, fortified positions, and the movement of military trains along regional railways and key transit hubs operated by Ukrzaliznytsia , the SBU said. He used Google Maps to mark the coordinates of defensive structures and relayed the data to his Belarusian handler via a secure chatbot.
Ukrainian counterintelligence monitored the operation, documented his activities, and carried out a successful raid, detaining the suspect at his home.
SBU officers confiscated his phone, which contained evidence of his communication with the foreign intelligence service. The man has been formally charged with state treason under Article 111, Part 2 of Ukraine’s Criminal Code.
He remains in custody and faces life imprisonment with asset confiscation.
Earlier, an open-source intelligence (OSINT) investigation revealed the internal hierarchy and operational reach of one of the Russian Federal Security Service’s most secretive divisions—Center 16—which specializes in electronic surveillance and cyber espionage.
