Since February 2022, the Kremlin has classified data on military losses in Ukraine. Charon is an independent database built by iStories Media that tracks verified records of Russian war casualties — including categories no other open project covers.
Most open-source projects covering Russian war losses focus on confirmed deaths of Russian citizens. Charon extends this to populations that fall through those gaps and adds research-grade collection methods. At the core of Charon is a custom AI model trained by the iStories data team to scan public death and disappearance notices across Russian-language sources — social networks, regional media, official funeral notices, and memorial pages. The model extracts five structured attributes from each notice:
Charon incorporates non-publicly available information from sources within the Russian military, plus contributions from a network of volunteers who send photographs of graves, memorial plaques, and clippings from local Russian media that never reach the indexed web.
Every record is manually verified by iStories staff and trusted volunteers before it is committed to the database. AI output is treated as a candidate, not as evidence.
Most open-source projects tracking Russian losses focus on confirmed deaths of Russian citizens drawn from public obituaries. Charon extends this in three ways: it tracks missing soldiers as a distinct verified category (about 20% are later confirmed killed), it includes residents of occupied Ukrainian territories drafted into Russian or proxy formations, and it tracks foreign mercenaries serving with Russian forces. Charon also incorporates non-public sources and AI-assisted collections from Russian-language media.
Each record passes manual verification by iStories staff and trusted volunteers. AI output is treated as a candidate, never as evidence. Verification typically requires multiple independent indicators — official obituaries, regional media, photographs of graves or memorial plaques, social-media posts by family members with consistent identifying details.
Academic researchers, journalists, OSINT analysts, employees of human rights organisations, and analysts at intergovernmental and government bodies engaged in accountability work. Each request is reviewed individually.
Suggested citation:
iStories Media (Important Stories). Charon Database, version [Last Update Date]. https://istories.media/en/charon/
Charon is updated monthly.
Charon collects information that has been published or shared with us. Records are used for research, journalism, and accountability work.
iStories Media (Important Stories) is an independent Russian investigative newsroom operating in exile. iStories was founded by journalists who contributed to the Pulitzer Prize-winning Panama Papers investigation and have collaborated with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) on cross-border investigations. We’ve specialized in investigations about corruption and data-driven stories about Russia; now we investigate Russian war crimes as well. Due to military censorship in Russia, Important Stories was forced to relocate the editorial office abroad. For numerous investigations into corruption and war crimes, the Russian authorities recognized us as an “undesirable organization” and a “foreign agent.” Despite this pressure, we continue our work.