Russian government edits Wikipedia page on Flight MH17

A Russian government official has been accused of editing the Russian-lanugage version of the MH17 Wikipedia page.

Malaysian Airline Flight, MH17, was shot down over eastern Ukraine on Thursday, 17 July. The flight was on a scheduled run from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it crashed, killing all 298 people onboard. In recent days, the focus has shifted from the crash itself to the topic of who is responsible. As the world started pointing fingers at Russia, President Putin immediately placed the blame on the Ukrainian military. Read More »

Ukrainian journalists take regime’s corruption public with YanukovychLeaks

YanukovychLeaks.org is a new website created by Ukrainian journalists to publish documents that were found in Victor Yanukovych’s residence. Many of them document evidence of massive corruption of the regime.

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Blogger Unveils Sochi Corruption Website

Russian opposition leader and anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny joined the Sochi anti-corruption campaign this week, launching an interactive website outlining what he calls the “true costs” of the Olympic preparations in Sochi. Read More »

New Website Collects Reports and Data About Bribes in Hungary

Hungary, like many other countries in the region, has an on-going corruption problem on almost every level of governance. A new project created by investigative website Átlátszó.hu and Transparency International, Fizettem.hu, has taken on the task of collecting reports from citizens about cases of bribery and corruption in the country. Read More »

Russians, Ukrainian charged in ‘cutting edge’ global hacking scheme

Four Russians and a Ukrainian have been charged in what U.S. officials call the largest hacking attack in the country’s history, RIA Novosti reports.

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U.S. bloggers courted to whitewash Ukraine’s Party of Regions

A proxy group working for Ukraine’s ruling Party of Regions organized a stealth public relations campaign in the States, contacting American conservative bloggers and paying them for favorable posts across social media platforms, according to BuzzFeed. The campaign started around the time of last fall’s parliamentary elections.

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Web of Mystery

TIRASPOL | An unusual event took place 7 July in Tiraspol, the chief city of Transdniester, when a group of protesters gathered on a park square and called for a stop to the obstruction of websites critical of the government. It marked the first public demonstration against the administration of President Yevgeny Shevchuk since he came to power 18 months ago, pledging a more open style of governing in the unrecognized quasi-state of fewer than half a million inhabitants. Read More »

Russian space program caught up in corruption case

The Baikonur space center, a Russian-leased launch site located in Kazakhstan, was the scene of a corruption case that resulted in the embezzlement of more than 15 million rubles ($456,000), RIA Novosti reports.

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Kazakhstan suffers cyber attack

Kazakh citizens are under cyber attack. The attack in question is delivered through phishing emails, and is thought to be driven by an advanced persistent threat (APT) organisation, via software called NetTraveler.

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Revealing e-book shares Azerbaijan’s political secrets

An e-book produced by the ‘International Consortium of Investigative Journalists’ (ICIJ) has been made freely available online and is aimed at pinpointing corruption in offshore accounts. In an effort to spread this information and to shed light on those involved, including a Kazakh banking tycoon and Russian corporate executive, the e-book details cases of corruption as well as providing summaries on those involved, and the information is spreading. Read More »

Cheat.org: What’s wrong with Russia’s online petitions?

The Russian government-sponsored initiative [ru] to increase public participation in policy-making through an online petition process [GV], was met with suspicion even before its launch [GV] in April. Now, almost two months later, opposition bloggers are crying foul, claiming that the process has already been corrupted. Read More »

New evidence emerges in TeliaSonera bribery case

Swedish prosecutors have filed new documents in an investigation into claims that Scandinavian mobile operator TeliaSonera paid hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes to secure an operating license in Uzbekistan, according to Radio Free Europe. Read More »

New Russian website sets targets on apartment repairs

After struggling to coalesce the increasingly targeted Russian opposition movement, anti-corruption activist Aleksei Navalny has launched a website to tap into public frustration over poor conditions in Russian apartment blocks. And after a month online, the site seems to be hitting a nerve, The New York Times reports. Read More »

‘Carousel Voting’ Goes Viral in Kyrgyz Elections

Nearly three months of intrusive and irksome electoral campaigns in Kyrgyzstan came to an end as votes were counted for the five municipal elections held on November 25. But with the results in, a scandalous piece of citizen media has left a sour taste in the mouth. Read More »