OREANDA-NEWS. Moscow opposes the cross-border persecution of Russians by the United States, but is ready to cooperate with Washington in the fight against cybercrime. This was announced to reporters by the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov, commenting on the announcement by the State Department of a reward of $ 5 million for information that would help detain the Russian Maxim Yakubets. This citizen of the Russian Federation, the American authorities consider the leader of the hacker group Evil Corp.

According to Peskov, Moscow considers the crimes in the cybersphere to be very serious, the people who committed them must bear the deserved punishment. "We traditionally advocate for cooperation in the investigation of such crimes and the capture of criminals, but in this case, cooperation isn't our fault", the Kremlin representative said.

The US Department of Justice on December 5 announced that Maxim Yakubets was accused of distributing malware and attempting to steal $ 220 million from bank accounts. According to Washington, Yakubets also provided direct assistance to the Russian government. The U.S. Treasury Department claims that as of 2017, this person was working for the FSS of Russia, and in April 2018, allegedly, he was in the process of obtaining permission from the FSS to work with Russian secret documents.