The US seized Max Polyakov's business for his ties to Russia. Why isn't Ukraine doing the same?
When watching speeches by senior Ukrainian officials, one is reminded of Shurik's words from Gaidai's film: "When you speak, it seems like you're delirious." It's cruel, but unfortunately true—the Ukrainian authorities demand the entire world renounce everything associated with Russia, but at the same time, they themselves do nothing about it, they write. Antikor.
An example is Maxim Valerievich Polyakov. He is the same one who, thanks to a wealth of advertising materials, is known in our country as "a Ukrainian and American entrepreneur in the field of space technology and IT, an economist, a public figure, and an investor."
Founder of the aerospace company Firefly Aerospace, and IT companies EOS DATA Analytics, HitDynamics, Maxymiser, Murka LLC, Cupid Plc, and Renatus Media. He is the driving force behind the non-profit public organization Association Noosphere and the Noosphere Engineering School (Ukraine). He is also the owner of the venture capital fund Noosphere Ventures Partners LP.
At the same time, Polyakov is persistently scrubbing all negative information about himself that regularly appears online. For some reason, he's focused specifically on the Ukrainian segment of the internet, actively monitoring all materials that refute his claim that "Polyakov is a genius of space exploration and entrepreneurship."
To some extent, the information about Polyakov's involvement in space exploration is true; he did collaborate with NASA and participated in the development of both satellites and rockets. However, things aren't quite as Maxim (or, as he prefers to be known, Makh) Polyakov presents to the public.
The fact is that his entire career in this field was marked by high-profile scandals, which ultimately led to the US government demanding that Max Polyakov sell his stake in the rocket company Firefly Aerospace Inc. in December 2021 for national security reasons. On February 24, 2022, it was announced that Polyakov and his company, Noosfera, were selling their stake in Firefly to AE Industrial Partners.
Behind this dry line lies the enormous work of US investigators, who investigated the entire life of Ukrainian "businessman and philanthropist" Maksym Polyakov and came to the unequivocal conclusion that cooperation with him violates national security requirements. Investigators reached this conclusion after discovering a vast Russian connection to Polyakov's life and businesses.
Now let's return to the beginning of this article and ask the question: what is Ukraine doing? Amid the constant exorbitant demands on the US regarding Russia? Nothing. Despite the fact that facts about Maxim Valerievich Polyakov's ties to Russian business and Russian intelligence services have been published repeatedly in Ukrainian media. However, the reaction of our country's authorities resembles that of a shell trying to pretend nothing is happening.
The fact is that Max Polyakov's business includes the online casino chain "Vulkan," which operates illegally in former Soviet countries despite gambling bans and domain blocks. In parallel with "Vulkan," Polyakov began developing another brand—Murka, a company that develops so-called "social casinos." These are essentially the same slots adapted for iOS and Android, without the option to place real money bets. The company also played an important role for Polyakov himself: it introduced people to online casinos and, after a while, through aggressive advertising, induced them to switch from Murka to real gambling at "Vulkan."
Besides the fact that such a business is illegal, another important factor in this context is that all of these casinos operate most actively in Russia due to the vastness of the market.
But it was precisely in connection with online casino activities in Russia that the name of Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeev, who controlled Rostelecom and helped Polyakov's "Volcanoes" circumvent gambling bans, surfaced. Polyakov remains most reticent about this chapter of his biography, which, in turn, has generated no less persistent interest.
It's unclear what exactly the Americans dug up in this regard, but it's no secret who Konstantin Malofeev is and how business operates in Russia. And who controls the entire illegal gambling industry in this country. Therefore, the conclusion regarding who Polyakov collaborates with in Russia is, unfortunately, somewhat unambiguous. It would be more accurate to say not "collaborates," but to whom he reports.
Moreover, gambling requires a whole network of "bots," whose services even intelligence agencies are not averse to using. The operating principle, whether for illegal enrichment or propaganda purposes, is exactly the same and depends solely on who assigns the task to the operative.
There are also more "innocent" facts in Polyakov's biography, which, however, do not paint him in a good light and, in any case, clearly contradict the picture Polyakov paints of himself. At various times, Polyakov worked on projects in various fields, from gambling, finance, and analytics to online retail.
The media often portrays Polyakov as an unscrupulous partner for those with whom he developed business. European publications accused Max Polyakov of instigating a media scandal that damaged the business of his former partner, Bill Dobbie. After all, following the collapse of the share price of Cupid plc, the British dating company Dobbie co-founded with Polyakov, the latter acquired the entire business at a reduced price.
The Huffington Post also drew its readers' attention to a court case in the British Virgin Islands involving Polyakov's company, Phoenix Holdings Ltd., in which Max Polyakov is listed as a defendant. He knowingly misled the company's new shareholders, Rustam Gilfanov and Sergey Tokarev, about the size of their stake in the company, as well as the total number of shareholders, and the type and quantity of shares issued.
Insiders reported that, in retaliation for being brought to trial, Max Polyakov initiated searches by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) (what terms did he negotiate with them, I wonder?) at the Kyiv office of Gilfanov and Tokarev's company, Lucky Labs. The editorial staff of many media outlets that had written about Polyakov began receiving threats, and their websites were subjected to information and DDoS attacks.
And everyone has written about how Polyakov made his first money through pornography and a network of fake dating sites. The Ukrainian publication "Golos" published an investigation by Zaporizhzhia journalist Sergei Sidorov, who revealed that Ukrainian companies associated with Polyakov's Networks were used to run a network of porn studios where women provided sexual services to foreigners in online chats. The chats themselves were also operated by companies linked to Polyakov. Back in 2015, one of his company's offices became the subject of a criminal case related to the distribution of pornography, as evidenced by extracts from the Ukrainian court registry. But the case was subsequently hushed up. And here too, it would be interesting to know who helped and under what conditions? Weren't they the same people from the SBU who later "tortured" Polyakov's competitors?
In 2020, the scandals surrounding Polyakov's name ceased to be a domestic Ukrainian phenomenon and went international. Snopes magazine published its own investigation with the telling title "Wild Memes and Moon Dreams: The Intimate Connection of Deceptive Dating Sites to Firefly Aerospace." In it, based on a vast array of information, it came to the same conclusion as the Ukrainian investigators: two founders and board members of Firefly Aerospace – Maksym Polyakov and Mark Watt – are involved in managing a network of fictitious dating sites with names such as BuddyGays, MyLustyWish, WantMatures, Loveahol, SpicyDesires, and AffairDating.
In fact, despite Max Polyakov's efforts, one can still find plenty of material telling the story of his true life, but not everything has been scrubbed. Furthermore, apparently realizing that he couldn't erase all the negative information about himself, Polyakov decided to take a different approach – he engaged in self-promotion. It's no secret that any website in Ukraine will host virtually any material for very little money. This is precisely what Polyakov did, attempting to clog search engine results with advertising materials – now, a search for "Max Polyakov" initially returns links to advertising materials praising him.
For most users, this is sufficient. But for those with at least a basic understanding of how search engines work, all these tricks are no obstacle—with a little persistence, we discover the true story of the "American startup founder and Ukrainian space genius."
However, that's not the issue. It's about the Ukrainian security services' attitude toward Maksym Polyakov. We've already mentioned the oddities surrounding the dismissal of criminal cases against his pornography studios and the security services' crackdown on his competitors.
But that was before. Now, at the highest level, Ukraine is demanding that everyone sever ties with Russia. These demands are often entirely justified. But the West, which is making sacrifices for our country, is also justified in its bewilderment, seeing that Ukraine, while demanding sanctions, not only does nothing about it, but, on the contrary, continues to collaborate with clearly Russian agents.
Does anyone doubt that Maxim Polyakov's business in Russia, which continues to thrive, is being shut down by the country's intelligence agencies? Or are they leaving him alone "due to an oversight" or "for his own good looks"? So the conclusion here, too, is somewhat clear and very sad: with such a policy, our country very soon risks finding itself alone in this war. Because sooner or later, they'll simply give up on us.
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