POLITICO: Oxygen Forensics, accused of links to Russia, sold software to European police forces, including in Romania

U.S. company Oxygen Forensics, accused by American prosecutors of being secretly owned and managed by Russian citizens, supplied digital forensics software to European agencies, including in Romania, according to a POLITICO investigation. The information was published after the arrest of CEO Lee Reiber in the United States and Russian citizen Oleg Davydov in the United Kingdom.

Oxygen develops programs capable of extracting and analyzing data from phones and computers. U.S. prosecutors allege that the technology was developed in Russia and that a sister company, MKO Systems, sold the same technology to Russian security services, including the FSB. However, the complaint does not claim that the software contained malicious code or was used to gain unauthorized access to customers’ data.

The company was involved in the European EVIDENCE and INSPECTr projects, funded before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and had contracts or accreditations in Germany, Spain, Italy, Poland, and Hungary. Romania and Latvia reportedly purchased the software in September. The European Commission says Oxygen did not receive direct European funding. National authorities did not comment on the information.