Moscow City Court takes up Pavel Vrublevsky’s appeal in the ChronoPay case, and calls the child’s father to testify

ChronoPay founder Pavel Vrublevsky is appealing a 10-year sentence in a case that, among other things, involves a five-year-old girl using her mother’s card to pay for clothing for a virtual doll. For high-risk payment operators, the interesting part is not the doll; it is the alleged carding-style flow, the use of payment processing software, and the court’s focus on where authorization and liability actually sit.

1. On 29 September, the Moscow City Court began hearing the appeal against the Khамовники District Court of Moscow’s verdict. The defense asked to overturn the sentence, and the court decided to summon the girl’s father to clarify the circumstances around the payment.
2. On 27 October 2025, the district court found Pavel Vrublevsky, the CEO of ChronoPay Vostok, company employee Alexey Belyaev, programmer Matvey Vedyashkin, and the “de facto head” of Vangud, Anna Akimova, guilty of fraud committed by an organized group, theft, laundering of criminal proceeds, and illegal circulation of payment instruments. The charges were under articles including ch. 4 art. 159, ch. 4 art. 158, ch. 4 art. 174.1, and ch. 2 art. 187 of the Russian Criminal Code.
3. The court case centers on more than 400 million rubles in allegedly unlawful payment activity. According to the prosecution, money was charged to cards through websites that promised rewards for taking surveys, quizzes, and lotteries. After users paid a registration fee or commission, the funds went to Vangud accounts.
4. The prosecution says ChronoPay Vostok processing software generated false electronic messages confirming payment for goods and services, and that this formed part of the theft scheme. The defense disputes that framing, saying card debits were impossible without SMS verification by the cardholder, and that the defendants had no access to that verification channel.
5. Vrublevsky also said that Vangud was a client of ChronoPay, but that the payment company did not participate in its projects and did not know what products were being sold. That is the bit PSPs will recognize immediately: on paper, a processor can look far removed from the merchant side; in practice, courts tend to ask how much the processor knew, what it enabled, and where the control points were.