The SSU cyber units have stopped the theft of assets of Ukrainian companies located in the temporarily occupied territories. Officials of the State Tax Service were involved in this criminal scheme. Due to their unlawful activities, Ukrainian entrepreneurs lost over UAH 150 mln in Hryvnia equivalent (USD 3.9 mln).

The scheme included VAT fraud. The organizers misappropriated the ‘tax limit’ that belonged to the Ukrainian companies that were temporarily occupied by the ruscists. This enabled them to pay less of than their own VAT and earn tens of millions of Hryvnias.

According to the investigation, the head of the Directorate for Prevention and Detection of Corruption of the Main State Tax Service Department in Dnipropetrovsk region and two of his subordinates are involved in the offence.

To implement the scheme, the fraudsters carried out unauthorized interference in the tax databases and counterfeited digital signatures of company executives.

This allowed them to register fictitious business transactions with affiliated commercial entities in the electronic taxpayer accounts of the temporarily non-operating enterprises.

The transactions were carried out without the knowledge of the heads of enterprises from the uncontrolled territories and were aimed at stealing their assets by unjustifiably transferring VAT liabilities to them.

The three officials and two of their accomplices, including the ‘accountant’ who ran the fraudsters’ false accounting, have been served suspicion notices under two Articles of the CCU:

• 185.5 (theft on an especially large scale);
• 362.3 (unauthorized actions with information processed in electronic computers, automated systems, computer networks or stored on the carriers of such information, committed by a person entitled to access it).

The investigation is ongoing to identify and bring to justice all those involved.

The SSU carried out the investigation jointly with the National Police under the supervision of the Prosecutor General’s Office and with the assistance of the Department for Prevention and Detection of Corruption of the State Tax Service.