Cyber Hack · BBC World Service

Evil Corp: 5. Game over

November 17, 2025·45 min·4 clips

A blast rips through cybercrime kingpin Tank's apartment in war-torn Donetsk, forcing him into a new life.

War changes the room. In Donetsk, a city that's home to nearly a million people, Tank's tower block takes a direct hit as the violence moves closer. The footage keeps rolling: heavy shelling, huge smoke clouds, explosion after explosion, and then the blast through his apartment and his young daughter's bedroom. After that, the case gets smaller and more frustrating. What can American prosecutors actually prove? Intelligence is not evidence. Russian security officials have identified Aqua as Maxim Yakubets, but that does not mean they will show up in court. That gap matters. FSB agents have never served as prosecution witnesses in an American courtroom, and Ukraine-era tensions make cooperation even harder. Keith Malarski knows the risk. A name can point investigators in the right direction, but without testimony or evidence, it may fall apart at trial. Game Over Zeus comes down. After four years and more than $100 million in alleged losses, the campaign ends. Still, the win has limits. The hackers remain at large, and Yakubets is no longer just waiting around. He seems ready to stop serving bigger bosses or running money mules and become the main man of his own gang.

As heard by us

A cybercrime chase story that moves from Donetsk to the GameOver Zeus takedown.

The episode treats cybercrime as a case built for law enforcement, moving from Tank in wartime Donetsk to the GameOver Zeus takedown and the harder question of what can actually hold up in court.

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Why you'd press play

For when you want a cybercrime takedown story that keeps widening into intelligence, court evidence, and Russian-state tension.

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