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Sergey Pavlovich talks to one of the most famous carders – Roman "Boa" Vega. How his development began, how he collaborated with the special services and how he ended up in the hands of the FBI – you will learn about this and much more in this topic.
Contents:
The character mentioned in the interview:
Roman Stepanenko (Vega) - in 2003, together with Liratto, he was detained in Cyprus and extradited to the USA. He is in the New York Metropolitan Detention Center. The investigation lasted 9 years, there was a trial. Many believe that this is impossible in America, but it turns out that it is very possible.
During his time in prison, he greatly improved his English, and has been studying Japanese for 5 years. He is surrounded by stacks of books and magazines, maintains an extensive correspondence, and has achieved success in yoga. He is in a cheerful mood and does not give up.
Why did they give you such a long term?
Pavlovich:
Roma, on your website romanvega.ru, or on yours, yes, created by the efforts of your friends, while you were trampling American soil, let's say, it is written that, in general, after 10 years of investigation and preparation for trials, blah-blah-blah, you were sentenced to eighteen years in the federal prison system instead of the expected life sentence.
Why and for what were you threatened with such a term, if carding in the USA usually gives less?
Carder:
Seryozha, this is a very long story, because in the nineties it so happened that I had a number of companies that were engaged in the supply of various degrees of special equipment, anti-terrorism, well, and other things of this kind, to a number of countries.
Before that, all this was done exclusively by companies, such as, for example, TTS in Manhattan, these were disguises for the CIA, the Central Intelligence Agency. And what did they do? They did the following, for example, take a hypothetical Central Asian country, let's say Kyrgyzstan.
They organize some conference, in the States, in Europe somewhere else, and invite some third deputy, fourth directorate, some ministry.
And these were the 90s, when people had no money, and even more so in Central Asia, and in Latin America the same, and in Southeast Asia, and such a little man comes, they give him a tape recorder, it was cool then, and they say, listen, Adygulbek, And here's a card for you. He says, what am I going to do with it?
He says, well, you'll have some money here, when you're in Europe, you'll be able to spend it. And this Adygulbek, he's some 127th on the list of everyone, well, a year passes, they call him and say, Adygulbek, you have it there, please, come to Switzerland, another conference.
He arrives, and then everything is there for him, and he puts it in, they took him and taught him how to put this card in an ATM, he puts it in, and a bunch of money comes out, he goes to him, he doesn't remember anymore, he buys everything and green crocodiles, like in Mimino, and... And roller skates, and escort girls? Well, no, because it's not to that extent.
And he comes home, and he has this harem of his there, and all his friends, oh, you're cool, you did it. Well, another year passes, another two. He makes one contract with the States, namely with the TTS company, there are a number of others.
Pavlovich:
For arms sales?
Carder:
No, not just arms. It was usually special equipment, and communications, and... Weapons rarely. And all sorts of crap, right down to some... For the gym, something like that. They all need to train and all that.
What does the CIA have to do with the leaders of states
Carder:
Okay, another year passes. This Ade Gulbek, he is already, so to speak, in the eyes of his accomplices in his own country, he is already cool, because, firstly, he has money from somewhere, and secondly, he has contacts with the United States. Then it goes, well, in general, it all comes to the point that suddenly Adygurbek becomes there, well, not always president, but sometimes prime minister.
And this is convenient for the CIA, because Adygurbek, listen, we, so to speak, we raised you. And what happens? No, I won’t, because here I have, well, and he has already, so to speak, grown up in his own eyes. They say, listen, we have video recordings here and all that, how you were sitting there in a restaurant, how you took a VCR from us four years ago, and now we hand you a card, and so on.
That's it, the country is already completely under control. So, and then suddenly I appear absolutely by accident, this was somewhere in the nineties, like that somewhere, and I take about 37 or 38 countries from them. Latin America, which they generally consider theirs, well, just, well, backyard, that is, well, their garden.
And I work normally with the guys, you need, this is special equipment, you need this, you need this, you need this, you need kickbacks, yes, please, we will solve everything, yes, everything, and none of these fishing hooks.
Formation in the nineties
Pavlovich:
But you hauled this equipment, it turns out, from the countries of the former Soviet Union?
Carder:
No, we had, it wasn’t just technology, because we did training, we did technical support, and we provided security services for presidents in about 12-14 countries.
Well, that is, comprehensively, etc. These were all the 90s. And, well, of course, when the CIA’s clients suddenly started disappearing, where did they start disappearing to? And here I am. They discovered. That is, somewhere, well, I worked in about 60 or 70 countries, mainly Latin America, Southeast Asia, because I know it, and, of course, all of our republics.
And then it turned out to me that I happened to live there in New York on Long Island, one of the corporations was registered there, and then I went to Miami, to New Orleans, well, and they began
spinning around this, and they would come, well, once every three days some kind of planted Cossacks would come, and my office was such that, well, no one just comes in there, and not a retail store, and nothing, that's it. Well, the doorbell rings. Hello, hello. I see two people there, a man and a woman. And I have a frame there for the purpose of identifying who has something recording.
It was there. This is in Miami. Hello, we are from the Basque Liberation Front. I say, in what sense do you mean San Sebastian? They say, yes.
And so we specially flew to you in Miami, and so they told us that this means you have something here that you can help us with, there are weapons, and all sorts of caches, and so on, and I look at them, well, pure FBI, not a gram, not Spaniards, in general, so, I say, well, sit down, and so on, and I go up to my place on the second floor. And I call Inake Alcorta, he was there in that liberation front, the second deputy or the first.
I say, Inake, do you have any gnomes like that? He says no. I say, could it be that they flew to me in Miami? No. I say, okay. I say, well guys, here's some tea, coffee. And they go out. And at the exit I have a frame. They step and, well, like, like the script did with their computers, everything just goes to zero.
Then they came a second time, a third time, well, and then the fourth time they arrested me, because it was ninety-nine, they, well, they are looking for something all the time.
How Boa fell into the hands of the FBI
Carder:
Once upon a time I installed lie detectors for the Latvian Police Academy. There was some general there, I don't remember him anymore. I told him, listen, this is equipment that has no right to be exported to the States, but if you want, then please, but these are the conditions.
You send someone, he buys it, as if he lives here. And what happens next, I don’t care. And this idiot, suddenly something broke or didn’t break, or he wanted to clarify something, he went and looked in the passport, where it was made in Tennessee. And he calls there and says, listen, what should we do with this? They say, what’s the number of your light detector? He says, well, I have sixteen of them here, and the numbers are such-and-such.
They look, and the shipment is from Equity USA Incorporated, that’s me. And they always have a plant sitting there. In every such company, right? Absolutely.
Absolutely. And he reports. What, to whom and how. To the FBI, to the CIA, to the ONS. And so in 1999 the FBI took me, and there was such a circus, I sat there for a little while, when in Miami I got bail for 100 or 200 thousand, I don’t remember, well, of course, I disappeared. The judge, and the judge was some Pole, well, theirs, an American one, well, this agent comes to the stand, who, the FBI, who took, well, so what, what, what claims and so on.
So, the light detector is torture, it is an instrument of torture.
And the judges turn around and say, listen, do you use a lie detector in your work? Well, anyway, he released me on bail, I dropped everything literally within 24 hours, sent my family to Turkey abruptly, they took all the documents and all that, well, I have documents hidden, always some dangerous ones somewhere. I flew to the US Virgin Islands, where I happen to know a boat to the British Virgin Islands, and then to St. Martin, and then St. Martin to Montserrat, from Montserrat even further
and so on, and to Curacau, and from Curacau there is a weekly flight to Holland, and I am in transit to Istanbul.
Pavlovich:
Anyway, I and half of our viewers and half of these islands have not heard of it, I think, but study geography, that is, in essence, your arrest in the first states was the fact that you invaded the territory where the CIA was originally the traditional main player.
Carder:
Yes, of course.
Pavlovich:
And the point, as I understand it, is not even in the money, because they don’t have enough money, but simply in the fact that you began to take away a little of their sphere of influence.
Carder:
And a sphere of influence, and a serious one at that, because I know at least three presidents of a number of countries who I know for sure are on the hook. It’s roughly according to the scheme I described.
Pavlovich:
Is this Latin America or the post-Soviet republics?
Carder:
Both. I can’t say, so to speak, but this has been going on since those times, somewhere around the end, or rather, not the end, but since the mid-90s. And it was put on stream so much that Africa couldn’t be branded there at all. But, thank
God, regimes change often in Africa.
How did contact with the special services begin?
Pavlovich:
Even too often. I would like it to happen less often, because it’s really impossible to do business with them in silhouette. In your main profession, at least from publicly available information, it is said that you are a specialist in integrated communications security systems, organization of protective intelligence anti-terrorist measures.
A Crimean by education, a mathematician. Okay, Simferopol State University. How did you get into all this, was the army some kind of special training, how did you join all these movements with the special services, anti-terrorist, intelligence and so on.
Carder:
Well, I like it. That's first of all. And secondly, you watched the film "Obrat-One", "Obrat-Two".
Pavlovich:
Yes.
Carder:
Well, I served as a clerk at headquarters.
Pavlovich:
Well, that is, it started somewhere in the army, right, essentially?
Carder:
No, no, no. It just happened somehow by itself.
Pavlovich:
But I like it. But at the same time, you weren't a full-time employee of some weapons intelligence agency?
Carder:
And in no way. I mean, if something happens, something... We've done a lot of interesting things, especially in Southeast Asia, but I did it because it was interesting. Now, if it was interesting for someone else at the same time, and if they had the opportunity to either help or provide support, well, for God's sake, but no-no-no, as soon as attempts there, but let's, no-no-no, everything is a done deal.
Especially, like we had in the White House, when they called us on August 19, they said, oh, damn, the State Emergency Committee has turned off everything, all communications, and we need to distribute these decrees here.
But I considered it as a rescue operation, and we just, Well, by chance, as usual, there was a piano in the bushes, like this, and well, from the 19th to the 22nd, when the State Emergency Committee was in place, we broadcast all the decrees, and we didn't care what they were about, but simply to prevent bloodshed in the regions, because when the regions sit and don't know what's
going on, it's bad, because who the hell knows what's going on in their brains.
Arrest in Libya
Pavlovich:
But you were also arrested in '93 in Libya and in Egypt, basically. Well, it happened. Two neighboring countries, give or take.
Carder:
Well, they took us in Libya, I had a Bulgarian passport at the time for this purpose, and with the team from Bulgaria, well, as it happened, that is, they had some kind of meeting of the Arab world there, and we ended up in Tabruk on the route of the then President of Egypt, somewhere there, I don’t remember how many kilometers from the border with Egypt, with weapons and radio stations, and a whole bunch of other stuff.
And they simply took us, presented us, well, they don’t present us, they just take us. An assassination attempt on Mobarek.
Because he was just walking, well, it so happened that he was just there, 12 meters from our window, his motorcade was supposed to pass. So we had all this music. Well, first, well, and he went on there. He was going to Tripoli.
Pavlovich:
Basically, he ended up at the wrong time, in the wrong place, you could say. Well, that’s how it happened.
Transfer to Egypt and escape
Carder:
We were taken to Tabruki, then held there for two days, and then transferred to Alexandria, this is Egypt, handed over to the Egyptian special services, counterintelligence. And before that, like, that is, and they have big problems in Turkey both before and now, and they saw in my passport that literally the day before entering Egypt and Libya, I was in Turkey.
Well, I'm a Turkish agent and all that, they only speak Arabic to me, I don't understand what you're talking about at all. And that one, there was one like that, and they shot him, now when they had that one there, well, that's the story with the golden pistol, that's it. Well, Gaddafi, yes. And they conferred, handed us over to Egypt, and we sat in Alexandria, well, for about two weeks, probably, and so on.
So, they surrounded us with guards, the second floor, we were sitting on the second floor, there was a trestle bed, the water was rusty, there was no glass in the windows, it was hot, well, understandably, because it was August '93.
Well, to be on the safe side, they took and put a guard with a Kalashnikov right in our cell.
Pavlovich:
Straight to the Canary Islands?
Carder:
Yes. Well, that's where the map came to us, of course. So, well, we escaped. So, we escaped and ran for a long time, and all that. Well, anyway, we ended up in Crete. The dry cargo ship was conveniently moored there, then I made arrangements with the captain, that's it. And so we returned to Bulgaria.
I had a family in Bulgaria, right then, in Sofia, and we crossed ourselves, and we were sitting with Dancho, and Dancho, Dancho is Jordan Radkov, he was then in '96, '97, '98, either the head of the Klimento-Arkhidsky Antarctic station, well, that's the Bulgarian station in Antarctica, or the head. And so Dancho, I say, Dancho, well, did you like the expedition?
She says, Roma, you know, it's like I've been born a second time.
Why didn't you become a career intelligence officer?
Pavlovich:
How was it possible to stir up all these special operations in the then Soviet republics, and Latin America, and Southeast Asia, and not be, say, a career intelligence officer or recruited in some way, you say that interests did not intersect, when they did they helped.
Carder:
That is, it was still the Soviet Union, me.
Pavlovich:
I understand roughly what happened. That is, you are such a free agent, a free shooter and so on and you stir up trouble all over the world and there are no claims against you?
Carder:
Well, I don't think so, that is, I am doing everything right, let's say, in a general sense, because my ideology is simple, that is, there is still, since those times there has been a constant confrontation, let's say, between Rome and Byzantium. Well, if we put it conditionally... Well, Rome and the West. Yes, that is, the West and everything else, because the West, the West that is now, is pure evil.
Why? Well, because it is pure evil, that is, take even Britain, take the States, especially, it has all migrated now, the States. You understand, because every country has a soul.
Just like a person has a soul. And a country has one. For example, in the States at the present time instead of a soul there is just a dollar. Everything is just such a big dollar. And from here everything comes, what is profitable, what is unprofitable, purely in terms of money. This is not good, this is wrong, I think. In what countries then is there a soul, in your opinion?
Well, there is a soul in some countries of Southeast Asia, there is a soul in some countries of Latin America, there is a soul in Russia. And, let's say, right now in this situation, as everything is happening in the world, well, perhaps only two sides, well, from the big ones, I mean, not that they are correct, but, as it were, have the right to exist, well, no, I said it wrong, but if there were no Russia, if there were no China, then it would just be hamburgers and that's it, and Coca-Cola, you understand, well, that is, I liked it, well, not that, I liked it, but, as it were, well, nothing surprised me, I fought in Afghanistan, and then I was in Afghanistan, I was also in Afghanistan, well, and I know that it is such a shithole, well, but when in CNN, I don't remember what year, when the Americans brought in their own, well, and literally somewhere about two weeks later something like this appeared, I don't remember, or in some Wall Street Journal or in the New York Times, and democracy came to Afghanistan, the first plant opened Coca-Cola. That's the essence of what's happening.
On achieving the goal
Carder:
In 1990, there were these Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, the Spratlys, which the Chinese are now taking over, both the Chinese and the Americans and all that.
It's an archipelago in the center of the South China Sea. We had, let's say, not exactly a task, but a secondary goal. To take and raise the flag of the Soviet Union over them. Well, we did it. That is, we got there under, let's say, the aegis, the cover of radio. And suddenly the flag of the Soviet Union was raised there.
Pavlovich:
Was it just symbolic, right? Or did it have some consequences?
Carder:
No, the plans were completely different, but, unfortunately, the union fell apart a year later, in which, unfortunately, I also took part, because as one of the founders of the society, and the memorial, and all that. Well, I was in the White House, that's it. But something like this, it’s all, it’s somehow, it’s not straight, and not this, but it just goes this way.
And what I like is that, how can I tell you, that’s what I feel, this is right, this is what you need to do, and then, well, come what may. When you do what’s right, then money appears, and people appear, and in general everything appears. That is, and this is an indicator that you are moving in the right direction.
You think about every little stone, here you need to step, here you need to step, here, it doesn’t work. Here, but the goal is there, and the stones will come from somewhere. Do you agree?
Pavlovich:
Well, again, you see, if you go according to your purpose, then it works out. And if you do the wrong thing, well, I don’t know, here we can talk a lot about the Universe, God and other metaphysics.
Carder:
No, Seryozha, you are absolutely right. If you are doing what is yours, what you have come down to this incarnation for, to this body, then everything will work out. If suddenly there is some kind of a stop, a wall, yes, then this is a hint to you that, listen... You are going in the wrong direction. And the door is probably there, there. Or maybe you need to go in the other direction, right?
Pavlovich:
I had topics that, despite their seeming obviousness, transparency and some kind of benefit, yes, they do not work at all. Perhaps they would work for you, for your neighbor, or for me.
Carder:
Leave them to hell. This is a hint. This is a hint that this is, well... Not yours. Yes, because we were born for what? In order to go through some kind of life experience, for our soul, for its maturation. We were born before this and will be born many more times. Well, if we are lucky. Well, like that same thing, Vladimir Semenovich, that if someone
is born a baobab, then he will die like that.
Pavlovich:
Or until we break out of the circle of samsara, if we accelerate further.
Carder:
But samsara is samsara for all of us, you understand, and samsara is a plus.
Pavlovich:
But there were people who broke out of it, who theoretically are not born in a human body. There are Jesus, Buddha, Muhammad, Kabir and others.
Carder:
Yes, well, take Buddha, well, okay, take Jesus, but Jesus was actually a pure emissary. That is, Buddha, he went through his piece, from the son of this king, or whoever they had, and no, everything is going as it should for everyone, and everything that goes, it should be so, but you need to pay attention to the hints of the universe.
Well, if, as you said, that it, well, doesn’t go well, well, I mean, then maybe it’s just a hint. Move to the other side, turn away there and so on. Well, it’s not your thing.
What did they want to give you several life sentences for?
Pavlovich:
When you were arrested for carding, yes, it was in 2003, I remember that moment well, you were arrested in Cyprus from Lirat by one of your team members, then they handed you over to the USA and you were threatened with, like, several life sentences. That is, it was all revenge, that is, they, or rather special agents and other courts and all the justice bodies, they tried to figuratively push several life sentences on you there.
It’s all revenge for your past deeds, those related to the government, special equipment, weapons and everything else.
Carder:
Yes, of course, of course.
Pavlovich:
That is, it had nothing to do with carding.
Carder:
I had nothing to do with it at all, they just grabbed me for what they could. In California, 600 years on all charges, and then in 2008 in August, I think. This is a separate story, perhaps you read that there was something interesting there.
Brayer, there are two brothers, Brayer, who is a judge in the California District in the ninth, and his brother is a brother, he is on the Supreme Court, i.e. they are two Brayer. And he says, Roma, listen, well, let's not admit to anything.
You've been sitting here for 40 months, let's just admit that you were standing somewhere nearby, and we'll let you go. I say, listen, this, I hardly believe it and have a hard time that they will let me go, but you say this with confidence? He, well, I'm a judge here in California, there, and I'm the boss here and so on.
I say, well, what do we do? I say to my lawyer at the time, well, okay, we'll buy it, and I looked, I had a Ukrainian passport at the time, well, their official one, that is, the one with which they took me. I looked, where can I fly without a visa? Ecuador. Well, for some reason I'm flying here for the fourth time and nothing.
I say, listen, let's make a route like this. I'm signing this guilt, but nothing. You ensure that I fly calmly from San Francisco to Miami, from Miami to Grenada, from Grenada to Caracas.
From Caracas to Ecuador, and that the guards don't come closer than 6 meters to me and my lawyer. He says that we agreed because I arranged a trial for them. And for them, a trial means that they will all be busy, they will drop everything and everyone will be busy.
That is, it was proven there that I am not Boa, I am not that one, I am not that one, but somewhere by chance there in Cyprus I ended up nearby. Well, Bryer says that this is the same thing, that, Vega, as we agreed, we you, you served, 48, I think.
Pavlovich:
Like he limited himself to serving time, yeah, like we have.
Carder:
Yeah, right. And so he takes his little hammer, that's it, I'm letting you go, that's it. Everything's fine, all our agreements are in effect. And then two gnomes stand up in the courtroom, Howard Cox and Thomas Dukes from the Department of State.
And they say, listen, no one's going anywhere anymore, because a new case just happened to be opened in New York last night. Five life sentences. And Breyer turns around and says, listen, this is against the prosecutor, and I, he says, considered you a decent person.
He says, well, I knew, but just a little, I knew and I didn't know, And he says to me that it's all in the record, in the court documents. And Breyer stands up and says, listen, Vega, I can't advise you, and I signed the PLISH back then in order to go to these 48 months, I can't advise you.
A federal district judge, he says. If I were in your place, I would now ask the judge to cancel the sentence, but they were counting on the fact that I would already have a term, and I already have a completely different category. Do
you understand? Figuratively speaking, for repeat offenders or what? There, it's generally up to plus infinity. Where did Pavlovich
get the carding material :
On your site, which appeared, well, existed there at about the same time as the planet, BoaFactory, I don’t remember the com or whatever domain it was, but definitely BoFactory, they sold counterfeit traveler’s checks, Tomos Cookie and Amex, I think. Then all sorts of counterfeit plastic cards, and dumps, of course, yes. That is, dumps, if you don’t know, are exactly what is recorded on the magnetic strip, and now on the chip of plastic cards.
Sold in large volumes, mainly in packages. And where did all this come from, how much money did it bring in?
Carder:
Well, I don’t really know about the money, because I didn’t bother with this issue. But, in principle, now I’m looking at the retrospective, so to speak, that the main high-quality dumps came from Skorpo, from Volodya, but they went through Gabrik.
Pavlovich:
But Gabrik was simply the main seller of drinks.
Carder:
Yeah, right, and from Gabrik they went through Klyukva. Right, and you know Klyukva.
Pavlovich:
There was Tron at that time.
Carder:
There was Tron, yes.
Pavlovich:
Tron from Moscow screwed us over for 30 thousand dollars, a dishonest person.
Carder:
Tron, I remember the nickname Tron, but I don’t remember anything else about him. That is, he didn’t screw me over, so I wasn’t interested in him.
Pavlovich:
Ah, well, the lady is clear, okay, and what about the fake passports of a number of countries, you had official citizenship there, some other one was sold to Ireland, I think, for 25 or how many thousand dollars or euros?
Carder:
48, I think. What is that? Well, I had all sorts of contacts, and that is, as for the passports, we had 22 countries, I think, of which we simply made one to one, and even better in quality, as I said. Well, the European Union a lot, then Bahrain, I think, but it is clear that we did not touch either the States or the Soviet Union, because, well, the Soviet Union, because I have such a policy, well, it was, and the States, because, well, well, I'm going to the bathhouse.
Well, but there were orders, I'll tell you, for example, somewhere around 600 Bangladeshis ordered passports from this Norway, that is, and here they are all, apparently, there now.
Pavlovich:
Well, these were simply fake passports, Spartans, printed there with high quality in underground printing houses.
Carder:
Well, why, they were quite open, and I had two printing houses in Bulgaria. Well, then, of course, they closed them down, that's understandable, but the volumes were large, because what you saw on the planet was, well, the tip of the iceberg, but the main thing was, of course, all sorts of emigrants were coming, from somewhere to somewhere, there were Bangladeshis, there were Indians, there were Mexicans, a lot of them.
For some reason, Mexicans were buying, like one, they wanted something there, that's it, Croatia. What do they need this Croatia for? Well, probably, there are a lot of Mexicans in Croatia now because of this.
There were all sorts of jokes, in order to get a passport you had to send your photo, year of birth and the date you want in the new passport. A sample signature theoretically? Everything is there, yes. Ah, although they then signed after receiving it. One lady, then, from the Czech Republic, Stirlitz. You know who Stirlitz is, right? And from Stirlitz comes an order from some lady there.
"My bust size is such-and-such, my waist is such-and-such, my height is such-and-such. Here is my photo, please make me a passport." Well, I write, listen, dear, please give me the year of birth that you want. What, can I choose any? I say, yes, please. And my eyes are brown.
Pavlovich:
Well, so that it matches the photo normally, then the border guard will look. Later, I also ordered from the same printing house, well, maybe more or less the same, I ordered from Bolgar, and it cost me after that arrest, somewhere in 2003-2004, I paid them 150 euros, the set cost me, let's say, a German passport, an internal ID, that's it, and a license, so I paid 150 euros.
Carder:
Well, that's about what it cost. And you splashed out about that much. Yes, that is, it, the whole costlessness was, well, 200-300 dollars, something like that somewhere. Well, but depending on the volume. Well, now, of course, I already had that, even then.
Pavlovich:
And these counterfeit checks?
Carder:
We made checks, well, we made them, well, they were somewhere around 80 percent quality, well, 90 percent, but not 1 to 1, there was a problem with the numbers, because several times we got real numbers and just made duplicates, yes, well, and in a separate case we made, well, that is, basically we made checks with just some numbers from Sharaban.
But everyone was always given instructions that guys, please sell them only on the coast, only there in Chapka in some place. But there were also large orders, all sorts of things. We warned that if you handed in the checks, you have about 2-3 days to leave the country.
Pavlovich:
But if you don't know, these are traveler's checks, that is, this is an equivalent, at that time there was not much crypto there, of course, and there were also mini-cards, not everyone had them, and traveler's checks were just a way to transfer money there to another country. You take this piece of paper, a traveler's check, that is, as an equivalent of money, you go to the Thomas Cook office, for example, or American Express and exchange it for crypto.
Carder:
I myself bought American Express when I went somewhere, I don't remember, somewhere to the Caribbean. And it's a headache. That is, you come, they are there... Well, in principle, not so much a headache, but you need to find those who accept them.
Contents:
- Why did they give such a long sentence?
- What is the CIA's relationship to state leaders?
- Formation in the nineties
- How Boa Ended Up in the Hands of the FBI
- How did contact with the special services begin?
- Detention in Libya
- Transportation to Egypt and escape
- Why didn't you become a career intelligence officer?
- About achieving the goal
- Why did they want to give several life sentences?
- Where did you get the carding material?
The character mentioned in the interview:
Roman Stepanenko (Vega) - in 2003, together with Liratto, he was detained in Cyprus and extradited to the USA. He is in the New York Metropolitan Detention Center. The investigation lasted 9 years, there was a trial. Many believe that this is impossible in America, but it turns out that it is very possible.
During his time in prison, he greatly improved his English, and has been studying Japanese for 5 years. He is surrounded by stacks of books and magazines, maintains an extensive correspondence, and has achieved success in yoga. He is in a cheerful mood and does not give up.
Why did they give you such a long term?
Pavlovich:
Roma, on your website romanvega.ru, or on yours, yes, created by the efforts of your friends, while you were trampling American soil, let's say, it is written that, in general, after 10 years of investigation and preparation for trials, blah-blah-blah, you were sentenced to eighteen years in the federal prison system instead of the expected life sentence.
Why and for what were you threatened with such a term, if carding in the USA usually gives less?
Carder:
Seryozha, this is a very long story, because in the nineties it so happened that I had a number of companies that were engaged in the supply of various degrees of special equipment, anti-terrorism, well, and other things of this kind, to a number of countries.
Before that, all this was done exclusively by companies, such as, for example, TTS in Manhattan, these were disguises for the CIA, the Central Intelligence Agency. And what did they do? They did the following, for example, take a hypothetical Central Asian country, let's say Kyrgyzstan.
They organize some conference, in the States, in Europe somewhere else, and invite some third deputy, fourth directorate, some ministry.
And these were the 90s, when people had no money, and even more so in Central Asia, and in Latin America the same, and in Southeast Asia, and such a little man comes, they give him a tape recorder, it was cool then, and they say, listen, Adygulbek, And here's a card for you. He says, what am I going to do with it?
He says, well, you'll have some money here, when you're in Europe, you'll be able to spend it. And this Adygulbek, he's some 127th on the list of everyone, well, a year passes, they call him and say, Adygulbek, you have it there, please, come to Switzerland, another conference.
He arrives, and then everything is there for him, and he puts it in, they took him and taught him how to put this card in an ATM, he puts it in, and a bunch of money comes out, he goes to him, he doesn't remember anymore, he buys everything and green crocodiles, like in Mimino, and... And roller skates, and escort girls? Well, no, because it's not to that extent.
And he comes home, and he has this harem of his there, and all his friends, oh, you're cool, you did it. Well, another year passes, another two. He makes one contract with the States, namely with the TTS company, there are a number of others.
Pavlovich:
For arms sales?
Carder:
No, not just arms. It was usually special equipment, and communications, and... Weapons rarely. And all sorts of crap, right down to some... For the gym, something like that. They all need to train and all that.
What does the CIA have to do with the leaders of states
Carder:
Okay, another year passes. This Ade Gulbek, he is already, so to speak, in the eyes of his accomplices in his own country, he is already cool, because, firstly, he has money from somewhere, and secondly, he has contacts with the United States. Then it goes, well, in general, it all comes to the point that suddenly Adygurbek becomes there, well, not always president, but sometimes prime minister.
And this is convenient for the CIA, because Adygurbek, listen, we, so to speak, we raised you. And what happens? No, I won’t, because here I have, well, and he has already, so to speak, grown up in his own eyes. They say, listen, we have video recordings here and all that, how you were sitting there in a restaurant, how you took a VCR from us four years ago, and now we hand you a card, and so on.
That's it, the country is already completely under control. So, and then suddenly I appear absolutely by accident, this was somewhere in the nineties, like that somewhere, and I take about 37 or 38 countries from them. Latin America, which they generally consider theirs, well, just, well, backyard, that is, well, their garden.
And I work normally with the guys, you need, this is special equipment, you need this, you need this, you need this, you need kickbacks, yes, please, we will solve everything, yes, everything, and none of these fishing hooks.
Formation in the nineties
Pavlovich:
But you hauled this equipment, it turns out, from the countries of the former Soviet Union?
Carder:
No, we had, it wasn’t just technology, because we did training, we did technical support, and we provided security services for presidents in about 12-14 countries.
Well, that is, comprehensively, etc. These were all the 90s. And, well, of course, when the CIA’s clients suddenly started disappearing, where did they start disappearing to? And here I am. They discovered. That is, somewhere, well, I worked in about 60 or 70 countries, mainly Latin America, Southeast Asia, because I know it, and, of course, all of our republics.
And then it turned out to me that I happened to live there in New York on Long Island, one of the corporations was registered there, and then I went to Miami, to New Orleans, well, and they began
spinning around this, and they would come, well, once every three days some kind of planted Cossacks would come, and my office was such that, well, no one just comes in there, and not a retail store, and nothing, that's it. Well, the doorbell rings. Hello, hello. I see two people there, a man and a woman. And I have a frame there for the purpose of identifying who has something recording.
It was there. This is in Miami. Hello, we are from the Basque Liberation Front. I say, in what sense do you mean San Sebastian? They say, yes.
And so we specially flew to you in Miami, and so they told us that this means you have something here that you can help us with, there are weapons, and all sorts of caches, and so on, and I look at them, well, pure FBI, not a gram, not Spaniards, in general, so, I say, well, sit down, and so on, and I go up to my place on the second floor. And I call Inake Alcorta, he was there in that liberation front, the second deputy or the first.
I say, Inake, do you have any gnomes like that? He says no. I say, could it be that they flew to me in Miami? No. I say, okay. I say, well guys, here's some tea, coffee. And they go out. And at the exit I have a frame. They step and, well, like, like the script did with their computers, everything just goes to zero.
Then they came a second time, a third time, well, and then the fourth time they arrested me, because it was ninety-nine, they, well, they are looking for something all the time.
How Boa fell into the hands of the FBI
Carder:
Once upon a time I installed lie detectors for the Latvian Police Academy. There was some general there, I don't remember him anymore. I told him, listen, this is equipment that has no right to be exported to the States, but if you want, then please, but these are the conditions.
You send someone, he buys it, as if he lives here. And what happens next, I don’t care. And this idiot, suddenly something broke or didn’t break, or he wanted to clarify something, he went and looked in the passport, where it was made in Tennessee. And he calls there and says, listen, what should we do with this? They say, what’s the number of your light detector? He says, well, I have sixteen of them here, and the numbers are such-and-such.
They look, and the shipment is from Equity USA Incorporated, that’s me. And they always have a plant sitting there. In every such company, right? Absolutely.
Absolutely. And he reports. What, to whom and how. To the FBI, to the CIA, to the ONS. And so in 1999 the FBI took me, and there was such a circus, I sat there for a little while, when in Miami I got bail for 100 or 200 thousand, I don’t remember, well, of course, I disappeared. The judge, and the judge was some Pole, well, theirs, an American one, well, this agent comes to the stand, who, the FBI, who took, well, so what, what, what claims and so on.
So, the light detector is torture, it is an instrument of torture.
And the judges turn around and say, listen, do you use a lie detector in your work? Well, anyway, he released me on bail, I dropped everything literally within 24 hours, sent my family to Turkey abruptly, they took all the documents and all that, well, I have documents hidden, always some dangerous ones somewhere. I flew to the US Virgin Islands, where I happen to know a boat to the British Virgin Islands, and then to St. Martin, and then St. Martin to Montserrat, from Montserrat even further
and so on, and to Curacau, and from Curacau there is a weekly flight to Holland, and I am in transit to Istanbul.
Pavlovich:
Anyway, I and half of our viewers and half of these islands have not heard of it, I think, but study geography, that is, in essence, your arrest in the first states was the fact that you invaded the territory where the CIA was originally the traditional main player.
Carder:
Yes, of course.
Pavlovich:
And the point, as I understand it, is not even in the money, because they don’t have enough money, but simply in the fact that you began to take away a little of their sphere of influence.
Carder:
And a sphere of influence, and a serious one at that, because I know at least three presidents of a number of countries who I know for sure are on the hook. It’s roughly according to the scheme I described.
Pavlovich:
Is this Latin America or the post-Soviet republics?
Carder:
Both. I can’t say, so to speak, but this has been going on since those times, somewhere around the end, or rather, not the end, but since the mid-90s. And it was put on stream so much that Africa couldn’t be branded there at all. But, thank
God, regimes change often in Africa.
How did contact with the special services begin?
Pavlovich:
Even too often. I would like it to happen less often, because it’s really impossible to do business with them in silhouette. In your main profession, at least from publicly available information, it is said that you are a specialist in integrated communications security systems, organization of protective intelligence anti-terrorist measures.
A Crimean by education, a mathematician. Okay, Simferopol State University. How did you get into all this, was the army some kind of special training, how did you join all these movements with the special services, anti-terrorist, intelligence and so on.
Carder:
Well, I like it. That's first of all. And secondly, you watched the film "Obrat-One", "Obrat-Two".
Pavlovich:
Yes.
Carder:
Well, I served as a clerk at headquarters.
Pavlovich:
Well, that is, it started somewhere in the army, right, essentially?
Carder:
No, no, no. It just happened somehow by itself.
Pavlovich:
But I like it. But at the same time, you weren't a full-time employee of some weapons intelligence agency?
Carder:
And in no way. I mean, if something happens, something... We've done a lot of interesting things, especially in Southeast Asia, but I did it because it was interesting. Now, if it was interesting for someone else at the same time, and if they had the opportunity to either help or provide support, well, for God's sake, but no-no-no, as soon as attempts there, but let's, no-no-no, everything is a done deal.
Especially, like we had in the White House, when they called us on August 19, they said, oh, damn, the State Emergency Committee has turned off everything, all communications, and we need to distribute these decrees here.
But I considered it as a rescue operation, and we just, Well, by chance, as usual, there was a piano in the bushes, like this, and well, from the 19th to the 22nd, when the State Emergency Committee was in place, we broadcast all the decrees, and we didn't care what they were about, but simply to prevent bloodshed in the regions, because when the regions sit and don't know what's
going on, it's bad, because who the hell knows what's going on in their brains.
Arrest in Libya
Pavlovich:
But you were also arrested in '93 in Libya and in Egypt, basically. Well, it happened. Two neighboring countries, give or take.
Carder:
Well, they took us in Libya, I had a Bulgarian passport at the time for this purpose, and with the team from Bulgaria, well, as it happened, that is, they had some kind of meeting of the Arab world there, and we ended up in Tabruk on the route of the then President of Egypt, somewhere there, I don’t remember how many kilometers from the border with Egypt, with weapons and radio stations, and a whole bunch of other stuff.
And they simply took us, presented us, well, they don’t present us, they just take us. An assassination attempt on Mobarek.
Because he was just walking, well, it so happened that he was just there, 12 meters from our window, his motorcade was supposed to pass. So we had all this music. Well, first, well, and he went on there. He was going to Tripoli.
Pavlovich:
Basically, he ended up at the wrong time, in the wrong place, you could say. Well, that’s how it happened.
Transfer to Egypt and escape
Carder:
We were taken to Tabruki, then held there for two days, and then transferred to Alexandria, this is Egypt, handed over to the Egyptian special services, counterintelligence. And before that, like, that is, and they have big problems in Turkey both before and now, and they saw in my passport that literally the day before entering Egypt and Libya, I was in Turkey.
Well, I'm a Turkish agent and all that, they only speak Arabic to me, I don't understand what you're talking about at all. And that one, there was one like that, and they shot him, now when they had that one there, well, that's the story with the golden pistol, that's it. Well, Gaddafi, yes. And they conferred, handed us over to Egypt, and we sat in Alexandria, well, for about two weeks, probably, and so on.
So, they surrounded us with guards, the second floor, we were sitting on the second floor, there was a trestle bed, the water was rusty, there was no glass in the windows, it was hot, well, understandably, because it was August '93.
Well, to be on the safe side, they took and put a guard with a Kalashnikov right in our cell.
Pavlovich:
Straight to the Canary Islands?
Carder:
Yes. Well, that's where the map came to us, of course. So, well, we escaped. So, we escaped and ran for a long time, and all that. Well, anyway, we ended up in Crete. The dry cargo ship was conveniently moored there, then I made arrangements with the captain, that's it. And so we returned to Bulgaria.
I had a family in Bulgaria, right then, in Sofia, and we crossed ourselves, and we were sitting with Dancho, and Dancho, Dancho is Jordan Radkov, he was then in '96, '97, '98, either the head of the Klimento-Arkhidsky Antarctic station, well, that's the Bulgarian station in Antarctica, or the head. And so Dancho, I say, Dancho, well, did you like the expedition?
She says, Roma, you know, it's like I've been born a second time.
Why didn't you become a career intelligence officer?
Pavlovich:
How was it possible to stir up all these special operations in the then Soviet republics, and Latin America, and Southeast Asia, and not be, say, a career intelligence officer or recruited in some way, you say that interests did not intersect, when they did they helped.
Carder:
That is, it was still the Soviet Union, me.
Pavlovich:
I understand roughly what happened. That is, you are such a free agent, a free shooter and so on and you stir up trouble all over the world and there are no claims against you?
Carder:
Well, I don't think so, that is, I am doing everything right, let's say, in a general sense, because my ideology is simple, that is, there is still, since those times there has been a constant confrontation, let's say, between Rome and Byzantium. Well, if we put it conditionally... Well, Rome and the West. Yes, that is, the West and everything else, because the West, the West that is now, is pure evil.
Why? Well, because it is pure evil, that is, take even Britain, take the States, especially, it has all migrated now, the States. You understand, because every country has a soul.
Just like a person has a soul. And a country has one. For example, in the States at the present time instead of a soul there is just a dollar. Everything is just such a big dollar. And from here everything comes, what is profitable, what is unprofitable, purely in terms of money. This is not good, this is wrong, I think. In what countries then is there a soul, in your opinion?
Well, there is a soul in some countries of Southeast Asia, there is a soul in some countries of Latin America, there is a soul in Russia. And, let's say, right now in this situation, as everything is happening in the world, well, perhaps only two sides, well, from the big ones, I mean, not that they are correct, but, as it were, have the right to exist, well, no, I said it wrong, but if there were no Russia, if there were no China, then it would just be hamburgers and that's it, and Coca-Cola, you understand, well, that is, I liked it, well, not that, I liked it, but, as it were, well, nothing surprised me, I fought in Afghanistan, and then I was in Afghanistan, I was also in Afghanistan, well, and I know that it is such a shithole, well, but when in CNN, I don't remember what year, when the Americans brought in their own, well, and literally somewhere about two weeks later something like this appeared, I don't remember, or in some Wall Street Journal or in the New York Times, and democracy came to Afghanistan, the first plant opened Coca-Cola. That's the essence of what's happening.
On achieving the goal
Carder:
In 1990, there were these Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, the Spratlys, which the Chinese are now taking over, both the Chinese and the Americans and all that.
It's an archipelago in the center of the South China Sea. We had, let's say, not exactly a task, but a secondary goal. To take and raise the flag of the Soviet Union over them. Well, we did it. That is, we got there under, let's say, the aegis, the cover of radio. And suddenly the flag of the Soviet Union was raised there.
Pavlovich:
Was it just symbolic, right? Or did it have some consequences?
Carder:
No, the plans were completely different, but, unfortunately, the union fell apart a year later, in which, unfortunately, I also took part, because as one of the founders of the society, and the memorial, and all that. Well, I was in the White House, that's it. But something like this, it’s all, it’s somehow, it’s not straight, and not this, but it just goes this way.
And what I like is that, how can I tell you, that’s what I feel, this is right, this is what you need to do, and then, well, come what may. When you do what’s right, then money appears, and people appear, and in general everything appears. That is, and this is an indicator that you are moving in the right direction.
You think about every little stone, here you need to step, here you need to step, here, it doesn’t work. Here, but the goal is there, and the stones will come from somewhere. Do you agree?
Pavlovich:
Well, again, you see, if you go according to your purpose, then it works out. And if you do the wrong thing, well, I don’t know, here we can talk a lot about the Universe, God and other metaphysics.
Carder:
No, Seryozha, you are absolutely right. If you are doing what is yours, what you have come down to this incarnation for, to this body, then everything will work out. If suddenly there is some kind of a stop, a wall, yes, then this is a hint to you that, listen... You are going in the wrong direction. And the door is probably there, there. Or maybe you need to go in the other direction, right?
Pavlovich:
I had topics that, despite their seeming obviousness, transparency and some kind of benefit, yes, they do not work at all. Perhaps they would work for you, for your neighbor, or for me.
Carder:
Leave them to hell. This is a hint. This is a hint that this is, well... Not yours. Yes, because we were born for what? In order to go through some kind of life experience, for our soul, for its maturation. We were born before this and will be born many more times. Well, if we are lucky. Well, like that same thing, Vladimir Semenovich, that if someone
is born a baobab, then he will die like that.
Pavlovich:
Or until we break out of the circle of samsara, if we accelerate further.
Carder:
But samsara is samsara for all of us, you understand, and samsara is a plus.
Pavlovich:
But there were people who broke out of it, who theoretically are not born in a human body. There are Jesus, Buddha, Muhammad, Kabir and others.
Carder:
Yes, well, take Buddha, well, okay, take Jesus, but Jesus was actually a pure emissary. That is, Buddha, he went through his piece, from the son of this king, or whoever they had, and no, everything is going as it should for everyone, and everything that goes, it should be so, but you need to pay attention to the hints of the universe.
Well, if, as you said, that it, well, doesn’t go well, well, I mean, then maybe it’s just a hint. Move to the other side, turn away there and so on. Well, it’s not your thing.
What did they want to give you several life sentences for?
Pavlovich:
When you were arrested for carding, yes, it was in 2003, I remember that moment well, you were arrested in Cyprus from Lirat by one of your team members, then they handed you over to the USA and you were threatened with, like, several life sentences. That is, it was all revenge, that is, they, or rather special agents and other courts and all the justice bodies, they tried to figuratively push several life sentences on you there.
It’s all revenge for your past deeds, those related to the government, special equipment, weapons and everything else.
Carder:
Yes, of course, of course.
Pavlovich:
That is, it had nothing to do with carding.
Carder:
I had nothing to do with it at all, they just grabbed me for what they could. In California, 600 years on all charges, and then in 2008 in August, I think. This is a separate story, perhaps you read that there was something interesting there.
Brayer, there are two brothers, Brayer, who is a judge in the California District in the ninth, and his brother is a brother, he is on the Supreme Court, i.e. they are two Brayer. And he says, Roma, listen, well, let's not admit to anything.
You've been sitting here for 40 months, let's just admit that you were standing somewhere nearby, and we'll let you go. I say, listen, this, I hardly believe it and have a hard time that they will let me go, but you say this with confidence? He, well, I'm a judge here in California, there, and I'm the boss here and so on.
I say, well, what do we do? I say to my lawyer at the time, well, okay, we'll buy it, and I looked, I had a Ukrainian passport at the time, well, their official one, that is, the one with which they took me. I looked, where can I fly without a visa? Ecuador. Well, for some reason I'm flying here for the fourth time and nothing.
I say, listen, let's make a route like this. I'm signing this guilt, but nothing. You ensure that I fly calmly from San Francisco to Miami, from Miami to Grenada, from Grenada to Caracas.
From Caracas to Ecuador, and that the guards don't come closer than 6 meters to me and my lawyer. He says that we agreed because I arranged a trial for them. And for them, a trial means that they will all be busy, they will drop everything and everyone will be busy.
That is, it was proven there that I am not Boa, I am not that one, I am not that one, but somewhere by chance there in Cyprus I ended up nearby. Well, Bryer says that this is the same thing, that, Vega, as we agreed, we you, you served, 48, I think.
Pavlovich:
Like he limited himself to serving time, yeah, like we have.
Carder:
Yeah, right. And so he takes his little hammer, that's it, I'm letting you go, that's it. Everything's fine, all our agreements are in effect. And then two gnomes stand up in the courtroom, Howard Cox and Thomas Dukes from the Department of State.
And they say, listen, no one's going anywhere anymore, because a new case just happened to be opened in New York last night. Five life sentences. And Breyer turns around and says, listen, this is against the prosecutor, and I, he says, considered you a decent person.
He says, well, I knew, but just a little, I knew and I didn't know, And he says to me that it's all in the record, in the court documents. And Breyer stands up and says, listen, Vega, I can't advise you, and I signed the PLISH back then in order to go to these 48 months, I can't advise you.
A federal district judge, he says. If I were in your place, I would now ask the judge to cancel the sentence, but they were counting on the fact that I would already have a term, and I already have a completely different category. Do
you understand? Figuratively speaking, for repeat offenders or what? There, it's generally up to plus infinity. Where did Pavlovich
get the carding material :
On your site, which appeared, well, existed there at about the same time as the planet, BoaFactory, I don’t remember the com or whatever domain it was, but definitely BoFactory, they sold counterfeit traveler’s checks, Tomos Cookie and Amex, I think. Then all sorts of counterfeit plastic cards, and dumps, of course, yes. That is, dumps, if you don’t know, are exactly what is recorded on the magnetic strip, and now on the chip of plastic cards.
Sold in large volumes, mainly in packages. And where did all this come from, how much money did it bring in?
Carder:
Well, I don’t really know about the money, because I didn’t bother with this issue. But, in principle, now I’m looking at the retrospective, so to speak, that the main high-quality dumps came from Skorpo, from Volodya, but they went through Gabrik.
Pavlovich:
But Gabrik was simply the main seller of drinks.
Carder:
Yeah, right, and from Gabrik they went through Klyukva. Right, and you know Klyukva.
Pavlovich:
There was Tron at that time.
Carder:
There was Tron, yes.
Pavlovich:
Tron from Moscow screwed us over for 30 thousand dollars, a dishonest person.
Carder:
Tron, I remember the nickname Tron, but I don’t remember anything else about him. That is, he didn’t screw me over, so I wasn’t interested in him.
Pavlovich:
Ah, well, the lady is clear, okay, and what about the fake passports of a number of countries, you had official citizenship there, some other one was sold to Ireland, I think, for 25 or how many thousand dollars or euros?
Carder:
48, I think. What is that? Well, I had all sorts of contacts, and that is, as for the passports, we had 22 countries, I think, of which we simply made one to one, and even better in quality, as I said. Well, the European Union a lot, then Bahrain, I think, but it is clear that we did not touch either the States or the Soviet Union, because, well, the Soviet Union, because I have such a policy, well, it was, and the States, because, well, well, I'm going to the bathhouse.
Well, but there were orders, I'll tell you, for example, somewhere around 600 Bangladeshis ordered passports from this Norway, that is, and here they are all, apparently, there now.
Pavlovich:
Well, these were simply fake passports, Spartans, printed there with high quality in underground printing houses.
Carder:
Well, why, they were quite open, and I had two printing houses in Bulgaria. Well, then, of course, they closed them down, that's understandable, but the volumes were large, because what you saw on the planet was, well, the tip of the iceberg, but the main thing was, of course, all sorts of emigrants were coming, from somewhere to somewhere, there were Bangladeshis, there were Indians, there were Mexicans, a lot of them.
For some reason, Mexicans were buying, like one, they wanted something there, that's it, Croatia. What do they need this Croatia for? Well, probably, there are a lot of Mexicans in Croatia now because of this.
There were all sorts of jokes, in order to get a passport you had to send your photo, year of birth and the date you want in the new passport. A sample signature theoretically? Everything is there, yes. Ah, although they then signed after receiving it. One lady, then, from the Czech Republic, Stirlitz. You know who Stirlitz is, right? And from Stirlitz comes an order from some lady there.
"My bust size is such-and-such, my waist is such-and-such, my height is such-and-such. Here is my photo, please make me a passport." Well, I write, listen, dear, please give me the year of birth that you want. What, can I choose any? I say, yes, please. And my eyes are brown.
Pavlovich:
Well, so that it matches the photo normally, then the border guard will look. Later, I also ordered from the same printing house, well, maybe more or less the same, I ordered from Bolgar, and it cost me after that arrest, somewhere in 2003-2004, I paid them 150 euros, the set cost me, let's say, a German passport, an internal ID, that's it, and a license, so I paid 150 euros.
Carder:
Well, that's about what it cost. And you splashed out about that much. Yes, that is, it, the whole costlessness was, well, 200-300 dollars, something like that somewhere. Well, but depending on the volume. Well, now, of course, I already had that, even then.
Pavlovich:
And these counterfeit checks?
Carder:
We made checks, well, we made them, well, they were somewhere around 80 percent quality, well, 90 percent, but not 1 to 1, there was a problem with the numbers, because several times we got real numbers and just made duplicates, yes, well, and in a separate case we made, well, that is, basically we made checks with just some numbers from Sharaban.
But everyone was always given instructions that guys, please sell them only on the coast, only there in Chapka in some place. But there were also large orders, all sorts of things. We warned that if you handed in the checks, you have about 2-3 days to leave the country.
Pavlovich:
But if you don't know, these are traveler's checks, that is, this is an equivalent, at that time there was not much crypto there, of course, and there were also mini-cards, not everyone had them, and traveler's checks were just a way to transfer money there to another country. You take this piece of paper, a traveler's check, that is, as an equivalent of money, you go to the Thomas Cook office, for example, or American Express and exchange it for crypto.
Carder:
I myself bought American Express when I went somewhere, I don't remember, somewhere to the Caribbean. And it's a headache. That is, you come, they are there... Well, in principle, not so much a headache, but you need to find those who accept them.
