Ukrainian anti-corruption agency reportedly finds no violations in disclosures of top cyber official

Ukraine’s anti-corruption agency has reportedly found no evidence that the country’s former security service cyber chief, Illia Vitiuk, owns more assets than his official salary could account for.

Ukraine’s National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NAZK) recently told a Ukrainian media outlet that it “found no discrepancies between the value of the property owned by Vitiuk and his family and the legitimate income that could indicate unjustified acquisition of assets.”

Recorded Future News reached out to NAZK to confirm the statement, and although the agency said it was considering the request, it did not provide answers within the discussed time frame. A spokesperson for Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) also did not respond to questions, stating that inquiries about Vitiuk's financial records should be directed to NAZK.

It’s unclear how NAZK’s reported findings will affect the career of Vitiuk, who was one of the Ukrainian government’s most visible officials on cybersecurity issues until earlier this year. The investigation into his personal finances began in April following a report by the Ukrainian investigative outlet Slidstvo.Info about a luxurious property owned by his family. 

Vitiuk was subsequently suspended from his post and reassigned to serve in combat on the front. Information about his current whereabouts has not surfaced.

According to Slidstvo.Info, Vitiuk’s wife bought an apartment in a premium residential complex in Kyiv and earns more than a million hryvnias a month (over $25,600) while on maternity leave. Government documents list Vitiuk’s wife as a “private entrepreneur in the judicial industry,” the report said. His mother, a doctor, owns two apartments in Kyiv. 

Two days after publication in April, Slidstvo.Info reported that an SBU employee appeared to have instructed representatives of the Ukrainian military enlistment office to draft the journalist behind the investigation into military service as retaliation.

According to Slidstvo.Info, employees from the enlistment office approached the journalist in a Kyiv shopping center, accusing him of evading military service. They were allegedly accompanied by an official from Vitiuk's department at the SBU.

At that time, the SBU said it was working to verify the journalist's revelations, but the findings have not been publicly disclosed. In May, Vitiuk was officially dismissed from the SBU by Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky. 

Slidstvo.Info reported that despite his dismissal, Vitiuk was recently spotted in a photograph from an event dedicated to the development of electronic warfare systems for the Ukrainian military. The image was published by one of the event's participants on Facebook. When a scandal broke out over the photo, the post was deleted, according to Slidstvo.Info. Recorded Future News could not verify this claim.

While with the SBU, Vitiuk frequently spoke at international conferences and gave interviews to major foreign media outlets.

He is not the first high-ranking Ukrainian cyber official suspected of financial misconduct. In November, two others were dismissed amid an investigation into suspected embezzlement of state funds. They are suspected of involvement in a software procurement scheme in which they allegedly stole  $1.72 million between 2020 and 2022.

Editor's Note: NAZK responded on October 11 with the following statement:

“Currently, the National Agency has not identified any discrepancies between the value of the assets owned by Illia Vitiuk and his family members and their lawful income that exceeds the subsistence minimum by 500 times or more, which could indicate unjustified acquisition of assets.

Considering the above, the lifestyle monitoring conducted in relation to Illia Vitiuk, Head of the Department of Counterintelligence Protection of State Interests in the Sphere of Information Security at the Security Service of Ukraine, did not reveal any inconsistency between his declared assets and income and his standard of living”