Microsoft said that an alleged Russian spy was an employee at their headquarters in Redmond. According to businessweek, the Russian spy was a software tester for Microsoft, who was part of a spy ring sending information back to Russian officials.
The group admitted to carrying money or sending coded messages back to Russian officials and instructing others how to obtain information that might be useful to Russia. The groups object was to construct fake identifications and infiltrate U.S. policy-making circles. The man working at Microsoft"s headquarters in Redmond, Alexey Karetnikov, has been taken into custody by the FBI.
One of the members, going by the name Donald Heathfield, was attempting to get an employee at Stategic Forecasting Inc to use his software. Heathfield was later identified as Andrey Bezrukov, and suspected of trying to use this software to secretly send back information to Moscow.
Bezrukov and “Tracey Foley,” who later indentified herself as Elena Vavilova, were both deported back to Moscow after revealing information about their home in Cambridge, Massachusetts and all the funds in their four bank accounts.