At the beginning of April 2016, two employees of Israeli private intelligence firm Black Cube were arrested in a raid on the Bucharest Marriot by members of Romania’s Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism.
The two – David Geclowicz and Ron Weiner – with computers used hours prior to hack into the computers of family members and other confidants of Romania’s Laura Codruta Kovesi, then a state prosecutor heading the National Anti-corruption Directorate (DNA), charged with leading the country’s anti-corruption efforts.
Kovesi was leading a number of high profile investigations into senior Romainain officials, including people close to the president. Black Cube was hired to find damaging evidence against her. The hack took place weeks before a decision was to be made on whether to appoint Kovesi for another term and it was quickly revealed that she was also investigating a former senior official from Romania’s intelligence service. His name is Daniel Dragomir and he was supposedly the man who commissioned the job from Black Cube, whose CEO, Dan Zorella, a dual Romainian-Israeli citizen, was also a suspect.
Two months later, on June 27, Zorella found himself in an Israeli police interrogation room. He provided his version of events to the Israeli police’s anti-fraud unit and a Romanian investigator who was also present after Bucharest had requested assistance with the case. Transcript of his interrogations reveals how the private intel organization works, finds clients and conducts its operations abroad. It offers of former spies, digital intelligence operations and political espionage.