An American CEO has been charged over an alleged plot to help Russian nationals infiltrate the US Secret Service and other critical federal agencies, prosecutors said.
Lee Reiber, 55, chief executive of Alexandria, Virginia-based digital forensics company Oxygen Forensics Inc, was arrested in Idaho on Sunday. He faces a charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
Russian national Oleg Davydov, 52, was arrested at Heathrow Airport on the same day, and the United States is seeking his extradition.
Prosecutors allege that the two men concealed from US officials that Oxygen Forensics was owned by Russian nationals and that its software was developed and managed in Russia.
If convicted, both men could face up to 20 years in prison.
Secret Service contract at centre of allegations
Oxygen Forensics signed a five-year contract with the United States Secret Service and its National Computer Forensics Institute in September 2024.
The company’s software is used to recover, preserve and analyse electronic data from digital devices. The National Computer Forensics Institute trains law enforcement and judicial officials in combating cybercrime.
The affidavit names several US agencies allegedly affected by the Russian-linked company, including the Department of War, the Department of Homeland Security and the department’s inspector general’s office.
Prosecutors claim the Russian owners were removed from the company’s public corporate filings after Reiber was installed as chief executive, president and chairman of the board in March 2022.
The firm was required to certify that it had no immediate or highest-level owner who would raise security concerns, including a group of Russian nationals, as part of the federal contract.
According to the allegations, the company’s ownership and the origins of its software were deliberately concealed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Reiber allegedly told Davydov in an email that the company’s links to Russia could not be discovered because it might “destroy this entire opportunity”. He also allegedly wrote that the company “hangs in the balance”, referring to the anticipated federal contract.
Alleged Russian development and management
Prosecutors say the software was developed by Davydov in Russia in 2000 and had previously been sold to the Russian federal security service, the Russian investigative committee and Russia’s ministry of internal affairs.
They also allege that the software was used by Russian government security agencies and continued to be managed by a team in Russia.
In March 2026, Reiber allegedly told government officials that Russians had not been involved in developing the software and that nobody in Russia had access to it. Federal prosecutors claim those statements were false.
The US Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said Reiber, Davydov and other Russian co-conspirators agreed to conceal Oxygen Forensics’ true ownership and the fact that its software had been developed in Russia.
The White House referred a request for comment to the US Secret Service, which did not immediately respond.
