U.S. authorities have arrested Oxygen Forensics CEO Lee Reiber and Russian national Oleg Sergeyevich Davydov, alleging they ran a years-long scheme to conceal Russian ownership of a phone-hacking and digital forensics vendor that sold tools to the Pentagon, Department of Homeland Security and Secret Service for millions of dollars in federal contracts[2][5][7]. Prosecutors say the Alexandria, Virginia-based firm repeatedly claimed to be an independent, U.S.-owned company with software developed domestically, despite being secretly controlled by Russian nationals and building its products in Russia[2][10]. Both men are charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, with Reiber arrested in Boise, Idaho and Davydov detained in London pending a U.S. extradition request[2][5].
According to the criminal complaint, Oxygen Forensics was owned and controlled by Davydov and four other Russian citizens through a holding company registered in Cyprus, even as Reiber was presented publicly as the firm’s American owner and chief executive[2][4][14]. The affidavit describes Oxygen Forensics as the U.S. successor to a Moscow-based company founded by Davydov that sold similar digital forensic software to Russian government customers, including the Federal Security Service (FSB), the Investigative Committee and the Ministry of Internal Affairs[7][14]. Prosecutors allege that the same development team produced software used both by U.S. agencies and Russian security services, contradicting repeated assurances to American procurement officials that Oxygen Forensics was a domestic operation with no foreign ownership or control[2][10][14].
The complaint ties the fraud to heightened U.S. sanctions on Russia following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, which intensified scrutiny of Russian-developed software in sensitive government environments[2][10][14]. After those sanctions were imposed, Davydov, Reiber and their alleged co-conspirators agreed to conceal Oxygen Forensics’ true ownership structure by removing Russian shareholders from public corporate filings and elevating Reiber as the face of a supposedly American company[2][11][14]. Despite that restructuring, prosecutors say the Russian owners continued to make “fateful decisions,” control bank accounts, set Reiber’s compensation and overrule his business choices, while the firm pursued U.S. government contracts[2][4][14]. Procurement officials at customer agencies later told investigators they would not have awarded or renewed contracts had they known the software vendor was Russian-owned and developed in Russia[2][5][10].
Since at least March 2022, Oxygen Forensics sold its mobile device extraction and digital forensics tools to the U.S. Secret Service, Homeland Security Investigations, the DHS Office of Inspector General and the Department of Defense, among others[5][7][10]. Court filings and media reports indicate that the Secret Service and its National Computer Forensics Institute alone spent more than $2 million on Oxygen’s products during that period, believing they were buying from a compliant U.S. supplier[5][10]. At the same time, Oxygen’s Russia-based predecessor allegedly provided similar technology to Kremlin-linked agencies such as the FSB, underscoring the dual use of the same software in both American investigations and Russian internal security operations[7][8][14]. The Justice Department stresses that the complaint does not allege the tools contained malicious code or were used to gain unauthorized access to customer systems, but rather that the company misrepresented who owned and built them[2][7][10].
Digital rights advocates argue the case highlights serious human rights and national security risks from opaque surveillance technology supply chains. Natalia Krapiva, senior tech-legal counsel at Access Now, said civil society groups had warned for years that Oxygen Forensics was “owned and built from Russia” and welcomed the charges as overdue confirmation of those concerns[5][3]. She noted that the same phone-hacking technology used in U.S. investigations has allegedly been deployed inside Russia to target journalists, activists and peaceful dissidents, and urged more than 100 governments using such tools to sever ties with Oxygen, impose sanctions and launch full investigations into how Russian-developed software embedded itself in their law enforcement workflows[5][3]. The complaint also references earlier disputes with rival Elcomsoft over alleged code reverse engineering, adding to questions about how Oxygen acquired and maintained its forensic capabilities[5][3].
Reiber and Davydov have not publicly responded to the allegations; attorneys listed for Reiber in court documents declined to comment, and no lawyer for Davydov could be reached[5][10]. The Justice Department’s case, supported by investigators from the Commerce Department, reflects longstanding U.S. government concerns about the security implications of foreign, particularly Russian, software in sensitive environments, concerns that officials say were clearly conveyed to Oxygen’s leadership as early as 2018[10][11]. For federal buyers and enterprise defenders, the episode serves as a cautionary tale about relying on vendor attestations without deeper verification of ownership, development locations and geopolitical risk, especially for tools that can access and exfiltrate data from seized devices[4][10][14]. As the criminal proceedings advance, agencies that deployed Oxygen’s products are likely to face renewed scrutiny over their procurement due diligence and may need to reassess other surveillance and forensic technologies in their stacks for undisclosed foreign ties[4][5][7].
References
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