Special operation involving 30 people: Bihus.info reveals how its employees were monitored

Bihus.info journalists have conducted an investigation and found out how the surveillance of the project team in the countryside complex was organised.

Source: Project founder Denys Bihus on the YouTube channel Bihus.Info

Quote: "Sometime in early December, we book a conference hall, a gazebo and barbecue area, 6 hours of sauna for the evening and a dozen rooms – all this is booked in the ethnographic complex Ukrainske selo (Ukrainian Village).

...Around 20 December, a strange character arrives at the complex. First of all, he is very interested in the restaurant. At the same time, he is not interested in the menu but in the location of the speakers, Christmas tree, etc. stand. He also booked absolutely the same rooms on 26 (December - ed.) as we booked on 27 ( December - ed.). He also booked a sauna on the 26 December. The only thing he wasn't interested in was the conference room.

... On 26 December, the administration of the complex observed the strangest corporate event of ‘office employees’. The guests called themselves office employees. A group of 30 shady people sit in the restaurant and fall silent every time the waiter comes in. 

... To bring in three dozen people to install cameras in the bedroom. And I do not doubt that in the sauna, too.

Cameras in the f*cking bedroom - for the whole team. Most of the team is girls. Rooms were booked on them. It is impossible to imagine what should be on the minds of those who carried out this operation and who planned and approved it.

My (Bihus.info employees - ed.) have now recalled seeing such devices – boxes in the rooms, similar to a fire alarm. When we went through the rooms the day before yesterday, they [boxes similar to a fire alarm] were no longer there.

...When we arrived, most of this initial technical team left us with 'prepared' rooms and a small task force. The task force is scouring the area, secretly conducting outdoor surveillance, etc.

The next day, on 28 December, we checked out in the morning and left. Immediately after we left, another d*ck came to the complex and again booked all our rooms and sauna. Only a couple of guests come to this number of booked rooms, but they take the keys to all the rooms to take pictures of the installed cameras.

But most importantly, some of the rooms were already occupied by someone. They couldn't get into them immediately and booked them for just four days.

Thus, for four days, these d*cks filmed the lives of complete strangers, and in the sauna too."

Background:

• On 16 January, a video was leaked online showing employees of the Bihus.Info investigative project apparently using drugs. The project's head, Denys Bihus, recorded a video message giving explanations and stated that everyone who works with Bihus.Info would take drug tests. 
• Later, Bihus said that after talking to the people involved in the video, it transpired that members of the Bihus.Info editorial team had been under surveillance for about a year and that fragments of intercepted conversations had been edited together from several episodes that were months apart.
• The Ukrainian Parliamentary Committee on Freedom of Speech has promised to formulate a request to the Security Service of Ukraine to investigate who was involved in the surveillance of Bihus.Info journalists.
• The Security Service of Ukraine has stated that it is investigating the circumstances of the illegal wiretapping and video recording of Bihus.Info project representatives. Criminal proceedings have been opened under Article 359 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (illegal acquisition, sale or use of special technical means of obtaining information).

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