Masha Shvetsova, Co-Founder of Vantage Intelligence, explored the consequences of the conflict in Ukraine on the global legal and investigative community during this challenging time on a panel alongside other distinguished speakers at OffshoreAlert Miami Conference which took place on April 24, 2023. Other panel members included:

• Pavel Ivlev, Executive Director at KRES Poliskola
• Tom Firestone, Partner at Stroock
• Robert L. Weigel, Partner at Dunn & Crutcher LLP

Fraud investigators and journalists rely heavily on digitally-stored information, but its provenance and use can trigger legal grey areas. Eugene Dizenko of Vantage Intelligence discusses complexities of open-source intelligence. | PDF Version

We were instructed by an AIM-listed telecommunications company to investigate suspected collusion between financial bloggers and investment funds who were alleged to have coordinated an attack on the client’s share price which involved amassing short positions prior to the publication of damaging information about one of the client’s former executives.

Our investigation found that a certain financial blogger was at the forefront of an effort to intentionally and strategically publicize information about the client that was designed to have the most significant negative impact on the client’s stock price.

Through research and extensive covert inquiries with industry sources, we confirmed the relationship between the financial blogger and one particular investment fund – which held shares in the client company and was one of the first funds to adopt a short position – which was also found to be involved in gathering and disseminating damaging information about the client.

Vantage was retained by a UHNW family in order investigate a hacking incident, the principal result of which was deletion of emails that were due to be submitted as evidence in forthcoming litigation.

The emails were deleted from several personal accounts which were hosted by major international providers. The investigation found that the attackers breached a WiFi network at one of the family homes and used Man-In-The-Middle (MITM) techniques to obtain credentials to the accounts.

Vantage secured client infrastructure and assisted in liaising with the service providers in order to recover the deleted data.

Vantage was retained by the owners of a biotechnology company in order to investigate senior executives who were suspected of defrauding the firm.

Covert forensic recovery of the executives' data was carried out and subsequent analysis revealed that they had incorporated a competitor firm in another jurisdiction and were funnelling business to their own entity with the ultimate objective of completely taking over the business of the firm.

Vantage undertook a multi-jurisdictional asset tracing investigation on behalf of a bank in support of recovering USD 120 million loan from an individual as per his bank guarantees.

Vantage has successfully located the subject and identified his newly acquired identity and citizenship.

After identifying multiple real estate investments structured through a chain of corporate entities as well as proving that the loan funds were used to purchase real estate holdings for his family members, we assisted in initiating bankruptcy proceedings against the subject in the new country of residence and supported fraudulent conveyance argument in courts.