A former head of the General Directorate for the Fight against Organized Crime will defend the intellectual property of A1

Yavor Kolev, former head of the Cybersecurity Department of the General Directorate for the Fight against Organized Crime, already works for A1. This was announced by the company on Monday. The former police officer will be responsible for protecting A1’s intellectual property.

Until now, there has been no such managerial position in telecommunications. According to the message that she “It will allow Yavor Kolev to take care of the protection of the copyright of the musical and television content of the company.” “It also includes the copyright of the sports organizations that A1 owns for the country.”, indicated by A1,

“He has 25 years of experience in the fight against organized and high-tech crime and is the creator of the structures to combat cybercrime in Bulgaria, and for almost 15 years he has been its director in the Ministry of the Interior and the State Security Agency. National.“writes the company.

Surprisingly, Kolev left the Interior Ministry in July. This happened shortly after former anti-mafia chief Ivaylo Spiridonov resigned. He left the Interior Ministry after the arrest on suspicion of bribery of the head of the department of “Drugs” Tsvetan Pankov and the policeman Kiril Vankov.

As a high-ranking official in the General Directorate for the Fight against Organized Crime, Kolev also participated in the State Gaming Commission, where the changes began after the prosecution filed charges against businessman Vasil Bozhkov. Kolev explained to bTV that his departure had nothing to do with the commission.

“My departure is not related to the Gaming Commission, there is no pressure from anyone for the act I have carried out. My participation in the Gaming Commission was from 2012 to 2019. I could not comment on my work there, since there is an investigation, they question me as a witness. I cannot comment on whether there was any influence from Vasil Bozhkov on the commission, because I have not established such influence“, he said.

As head of the GDCOP, Kolev led noisy actions. One of them was against the Chitanka website in 2010, when the servers were seized. The country was subsequently convicted at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg for the operation.

In addition to his positions at the CDCOC and the Gaming Commission, Kolev was the national cybersecurity coordinator at the Council of Ministers and headed the national contact point for high-tech crime at the Council of Europe, as well as the single point of contact. for Bulgarian law enforcement agencies from A1. The CEO of the company, Alexander Dimitrov, points out that in recent years they have been transformed by an intermediary who provides the transmission network into a media company that offers “exclusive content and television services“.

“We must take care of our content and monitor its legal distribution. I am glad that Yavor Kolev has agreed to take on this role at A1. He is an international expert in cybersecurity and the fight against cybercrime, with proven experience in the field of copyright protection in telecommunications and software piracy.“he said.