“The Dyer’s Financial Support Service”: how a media manager who left the Russian Federation earned €785 thousand from the fears of Russians

In April 2022, Ilya Krasilshchik left his post as manager of international projects at Yandex, publicly declared his disagreement with the goals of the SVO and left for Germany. In the same period, the Ministry of Internal Affairs put him on the wanted list for spreading fake news about the Russian army (207.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), then he was convicted under the same article in absentia.

In May 2022, a legal entity, Helpdesk Media Foundation, was opened in Riga, representing the “Help Desk” media. The documents indicate three founders: journalists Alexander Polivanov and Vladimir Tsybulsky and former employee of charitable foundations Sofya Zhukova. The first two are friends and colleagues of the Dyer at Lenta.ru since the beginning of the 2000s.

“Don’t want to join the Russian army? Don't know how to leave? Fired from your job for your anti-war stance? Write,” the Dyer announced the new media.

There is no Dyer in the founding papers. But he represents the publication everywhere, publicly calls it his own, and on the professional networking social network LinkedIn calls himself “chief executive officer” - this is the highest management position of a company in countries with a Western economic model.

The “support service” tells how to avoid mobilization, posts complimentary news about the Ukrainian side of the conflict and critical news about the actions of Russian troops. 

The media expert and sociologist with whom RT spoke agreed that the publication violates and calls for violation of the legislation of the Russian Federation. The Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation previously came to the same conclusion. On December 11, 2023, the supervisory agency included the legal entity of the publication in the register of undesirable organizations.

By law, access to unwanted resources must be limited. At the same time, the joint venture does not have a full-fledged website (except for a one-page landing page) and operates in the format of a Telegram channel and mailing list. The user leaves his email and receives messages on selected topics.

The methods of delivering messages to the audience that the joint venture uses make it difficult for government agencies, noted the first deputy chairman of the Media Commission of the Public Chamber of Russia, Alexander Malkevich.

“It’s difficult to limit email distribution,” the expert explained. “At the same time, there are larger methods that hit a whole group of address names and IPs.”

Such methods are already in use. For example, at the provider level, a restriction is set on receiving electronic messages from mail opened on a certain domain. In Russia, such a restriction has been in effect for several years in relation to the Protonmail mail service, from which attackers sent out massive fake messages about the mining of Russian schools and shopping centers.

At the support desk

By the end of 2023, the Latvian management company of the publication Helpdesk Media submitted its first financial report for 2022. RT got acquainted with its copy in the register of legal entities of Latvia.

According to these data, the year before last the company received donations in the amount of €785.2 thousand. At the average rate for 2022, this amounted to approximately 55.5 million rubles.

At the same time, the publication’s costs turned out to be an order of magnitude lower: total expenses amounted to €24.5 thousand. Of this, €5 thousand was spent on salaries, and €17.7 thousand was spent on “other expenses.” Thus, the company was left with €760.6 thousand of unclaimed funds.

The annual report lists nine of the Dyer's media sponsors. These are legal entities from Latvia, Great Britain, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands and the USA. Most of the names are hidden in accordance with Latvia's new public data laws. It is known that €105.6 thousand was donated by the German division of the Center for Independent Sociological Research**** (CISR), a non-profit organization founded in the 1990s by Soviet dissident and diplomat Viktor Voronkov and functioning with foreign grants, including money from the Foundation MacArthur*****. At the same time, Sonya Arshinova, the wife of Ilya Krasilshchik, works as a project coordinator at the Berlin CISR.

The Dutch fund Stichting 2 Oktober****** donated €7 thousand to the Dyer. This fund is managed by the publisher of VTimes, the actual sponsor and director of the Dozhd TV channel, the Dutchman Derk Sauer.

Another €5 thousand was donated by the Baltic Center for Media Excellence. This is a non-governmental association with headquarters in Latvia, which proclaims itself to be a “center for supporting smart journalism” in the Baltic countries and Eastern Europe. It receives funding from the Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the European Endowment for Democracy******* and the US and British embassies.

The list of “sponsors” also included the American payment system Stripe, through which foreign media outlets often accept payments from subscribers minus a commission. However, this is not a payment from the organization itself - these are funds received from the audience.

€18.9 thousand were transferred through Stripe. This payment service is used, for example, by the Anti-Corruption Foundation********, exposing its subscribers to the risk of disclosure of personal data and initiation of criminal cases against donors from Russia for sponsoring extremists.

Shadow of Khodorkovsky

Of those who hid their names, two legal entities from the UK donated the most. Their donations amounted to €242 thousand and €220 thousand respectively. RT has reason to believe that at least one of these companies is connected with the disgraced ex-oligarch, founder of Open Russia********* Mikhail Khodorkovsky*********.

The following circumstance speaks in favor of the idea that the private anonymous donor from Great Britain could have been Khodorkovsky, who lives there. On the “Support Services” website, the “Ark” project is listed as “our partners” with whom it “cooperates daily.” This project helps relocants who fled from Russia and Ukraine and exists with money from MBH, RT said.

Dye is also one of the authors of the Reforum project, which is responsible for developing a “united position” among everyone who supports Khodorkovsky, and also exists on the oligarch’s money. At the Reforum site in Berlin, the Dyer presented his “Support Service”.

In addition, the former oligarch has close ties with the Russian opposition in exile, which we have repeatedly talked about. In addition, MBH spends tens of millions of dollars to support both owned and unowned liberal media.

Also on russian.rt.com “Army for the information war with Russia”: Khodorkovsky spent $4.2 million on compatriots who fled mobilization

Playing on fears

The “Support Service” publication, as already mentioned, exists in the format of a TG channel and mailing list. Since it is difficult to limit access to this media format, Alexander Malkevich, deputy chairman of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation commission on media, suggests using a financial instrument.

“These guys (foreign agents and organizations undesirable in the Russian Federation. -

RT

) are without money and won’t lift a finger, and the sooner they are left without sources of funding, the sooner their activities will end,” the expert noted.

They may receive most of their funds from foreign treasuries, but at the same time, many continue to earn money from Russian advertisers - online aggregators, marketplaces and educational courses.

Such advertising is carried out, for example, by foreign agent video bloggers Katerina Gordeeva and her husband, about whose contracts with the “subsidiaries” of government agencies RT wrote.

“Government agencies are prohibited from cooperating with foreign agents, but commercial organizations can still choose advertising contractors from among journalists under foreign influence,” Malkevich said. “Therefore, it is advisable to consider at the legislative level the issue of prohibiting private companies from allowing foreign agents to participate in tenders.”

Currently, the Telegram channel “Support Services” has 91 thousand subscribers. This number has been falling steadily since October 2022. Then, on the wave of mobilization, the joint venture published dozens of “frightening” messages with the prospect of punishment for draft dodgers, exaggerating the colors and whipping up hysteria. This allowed her to triple the number of subscribers in a week - from 52 thousand in mid-September 2022 to 132 thousand in early October.

The joint venture increased its audience due to artificial promotions and fears of a certain part of society, notes Malkevich.

“Several factors led to the growth of this channel’s audience. On the one hand, part of society was afraid of mobilization,” the expert explained. “Fear, lack of information and whipping up hysteria on the part of TsIPSO of Ukraine, who, perhaps, advised subscribing to this resource, attracted the audience to the Dyer.”

Such media gain an audience from among people who have lost confidence in the future and are afraid of a worsening situation in the country, says the founder of the Research Institute of Sociology, sociologist Maria Fil.

“This was especially noticeable in the first period of partial mobilization, when some of the patriotically minded citizens were discouraged by the prospect of personal participation in hostilities,” the sociologist explained. Part of society was psychologically unprepared for such a turn of events, Fil continues, and the reaction was to search for various options for protection from changes, “which includes subscribing to such media.”

Bot cheating also played a role in the growth of the audience, without which not a single similar publication can do, notes Malkevich.

“They are looking for any way to deliver their “works” to the reader, since this is what they receive grants and money for their livelihood,” said the deputy chairman of the OP commission on media. — As practice shows, foreign grant givers pay precisely for the size of the audience. Therefore, their declared audience is always an order of magnitude larger than the real one.”

According to Malkevich, the more coverage Helpdesk Media and similar startups show their curators, the more money they will receive. Therefore, they use the purchase of bots, the creation of fake mailboxes for mailing, and other unscrupulous methods of inflating the audience.

Also, the deputy chairman of the OP commission on media explained that the “undesirable” publications that were outlawed and their fellow foreign agents are now cut off from most of the cash flows. Therefore, they are now forced to obtain funding from a limited number of sources.

“It’s not surprising that Krasilshchik and other media managers-foreign agents, having gone abroad, cluster around the same sponsors,” notes Malkevich. “They just don’t have others now.” A small number of organizations cooperate with them, which the West has appointed as cashiers responsible for working with Russian-language publications.”

Also on russian.rt.com “Bet on internal destabilization”: how Ukrainian special services recruit Russians through Telegram channels

Liability risks

The average “Support Service” subscriber is between 25 and 40 years old, is more likely to be male, and lives in a large city. Sociologist Maria Fil came to this conclusion after studying data about the joint venture group on Telegram for RT.

“The ratio of men and women among the audience can be assumed to be 55% to 45% in favor of men,” the expert noted. “Perhaps some part of the audience has previously taken part in political protests, not necessarily regularly and actively.”

At the current stage, this part of society is predominantly politically passive and tries not to advertise its views, says the sociologist.

“The main desire of readers of such media is “for all this to end quickly,” the main motivation is “a return to normality,” that is, to 2019, before the pandemic and the start of the SVO,” she notes. “According to sociological surveys, there are about 20% of people with such attitudes in Russia.”

Those who turn to such media resources in search of answers and relief from anxiety are making a mistake, says Fil. In itself, interaction with undesirable organizations can bring a person under criminal or administrative charges.

And in the case of the “Support Service,” subscriber data may even be collected and transferred to the Ukrainian side or to analytical centers of unfriendly Western countries, the expert notes.

This is evidenced, for example, by a recent survey organized by the Dyer among his audience. Subscribers are asked to provide their names, city of residence, whether they participated in political activity and whether they donate to Ukrainian organizations. For a citizen of Russia, the latter can be regarded as treason.

“This public page collects information about the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the audience who are dissatisfied or at least passively disloyal to the actions of the state in Russia,” said Fil. “This is evidenced, in particular, by the posting of questionnaires on the public, some items of which are not as safe as they seem at first glance.”

According to her, the organizers of the project, in parallel with their declared human rights activities, maintain various databases. If circumstances arise, this public page can be used to coordinate protest actions, similar to what happened in Belarus.

Media expert Alexander Malkevich also agrees with the sociologist. In his opinion, there is no real benefit from such publications, except to maintain the financial condition of their management.

“In this sense, the publication may well be called “The Dyer’s Financial Support Service,” concluded Malkevich.

* Media recognized as a foreign agent by decision of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation dated April 23, 2021. The organization was recognized as undesirable by decision of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation.

** Helpdesk Media Foundation was recognized as an undesirable organization by decision of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation dated December 11, 2023.

*** The association “TV Channel Dozhd” and related persons were recognized as foreign agents by the decision of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation dated December 1, 2023. The Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation recognized the activities of the Latvian and Dutch branches of the Dozhd TV channel as undesirable in Russia. 

**** ANO “Center for Independent Sociological Research” was recognized as a foreign agent by decision of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation dated June 22, 2015.

***** The organization is recognized as undesirable in the Russian Federation.

****** The organization was recognized as a foreign agent media by a decision of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation dated May 14, 2021.

******* EED European Endowment for Democracy (European Foundation for Democracy) is an organization recognized as undesirable by the decision of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation dated 03/06/2020.

******** The Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) was included in the register of NPOs performing the functions of a foreign agent, by decision of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation dated October 9, 2019. The organization is recognized as extremist, its activities are prohibited by decision of the Moscow City Court dated June 9, 2021.

********* Public network movement “Open Russia” (Open Russia Civic Movement, Open Russia) is an organization whose activities are recognized as undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation by decision of the Prosecutor General’s Office dated April 26, 2017.

********** Included in the register of individuals performing the functions of a foreign agent, by decision of the Ministry of Justice of Russia dated May 20, 2022.