A penetrating investigation into how the KGB rose from the ashes of the Soviet Union and reinvented itself at the heart of the Russian state during Vladimir Putin's rule

Andrei Soldatov is an investigative journalist, co-founder, and editor of Agentura.ru, a watchdog of the Russian secret services’ activities. He has been covering security services and terrorism issues since 1999, and his work has been featured in the New York Times, Moscow Times, Washington Post, Online Journalism Review, Le Monde, Christian Science Monitor, CNN, and BBC. He is co-author with Irina Borogan of The New Nobility. The Restoration of Russia’s Security State and the Enduring Legacy of the KGB (2010), The Red Web: The Struggle Between Russia’s Digital Dictators and the New Online Revolutionaries (2015) and The Compatriots: The Brutal and Chaotic History of Russia's Exiles, Émigrés, and Agents Abroad (2019), all published by PublicAffairs. He lives in London.

Irina Borogan is an investigative journalist, co-founder, and deputy editor of Agentura.ru, a watchdog of the Russian secret services’ activities. Borogan has reported on terrorism in Yugoslavia, tensions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and has extensively chronicled the Kremlin's campaign to gain greater control of civil society. She is co-author with Andrei Soldatov of The New Nobility. The Restoration of Russia’s Security State and the Enduring Legacy of the KGB (2010), The Red Web: The Struggle Between Russia’s Digital Dictators and the New Online Revolutionaries (2015) and The Compatriots: The Brutal and Chaotic History of Russia's Exiles, Émigrés, and Agents Abroad (2019), all published by PublicAffairs. Her reporting has also been featured in the New York Times, Moscow Times, Washington Post, Online Journalism Review, Le Monde, Christian Science Monitor, CNN, and BBC. She lives in London.