Born as William Genrikhovich Fisher, he was illegal intelligence officer OGPU-NKVD-MGB-KGB since 1927. On June 21, 1957, Colonel Fisher was arrested in New York by FBI agents. During his arrest, he identified himself by the name of his colleague and friend, as a result of which he gained worldwide fame as Rudolf Ivanovich Abel. The real name of the intelligence officer was declassified only many years after his death.

In 1967, under the pseudonym Ivan Stepanovich Lebedev (probably using the name of his brother-in-low, who died in 1942), Fisher published in one of the magazines the story he had written, "The End of the "Black Knights." The main character of the book is endowed with many of the features of the author himself. In 1969, based on the story, a film-play of the same name was staged on Central Television USSR.