Years after reading reports about "Tank," and after months of preparation for a visit to a Colorado prison, I heard the door lock click before I even saw him.
I stood up, ready to give this former cybercrime boss a professional greeting. But he, like a playful cartoon character, peeked out from behind a pillar, a bright smile on his face, and even winked.
"Tank," whose real name is Vyacheslav Penchukov, rose to the top of the cybercrime world not through superior technical skills, but through criminal charisma.
"I'm a friendly person, and it's easy for me to make friends," the 39-year-old Ukrainian said with a beaming smile.
It's said that his ability to cultivate relationships with powerful figures was one of the reasons Penchukov evaded police for so long. He was on the FBI's "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" list for nearly a decade and led two separate cybercrime groups.
The opportunity to speak with such a high-ranking cybercriminal who has left countless victims is invaluable; Panchukov granted us a six-hour interview over two days. This exclusive interview—his first ever—revealed the inner workings of these active cybercrime groups, the mindset of those behind them, and previously unseen details, including hackers still at large and the suspected leader of the sanctioned Russian organization "Evil Corp."
It took authorities over 15 years to finally arrest Panchukov in a dramatic operation in Switzerland in 2022.
He recalled the scene with a grumbling tone: "There were snipers on the rooftops, the police pinned me to the ground, handcuffed me, and even put a bag over my head in the street, in front of children. They were terrified."
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