Phantom accounts: why young Russians succumb to the tricks of scammers
The Bank of Russia has announced a new fraudulent scheme. Attackers posing as employees of the Central Bank or a non-existent "financial intelligence" agency in the Russian Federation extort large sums from Russians, convincing them to "replace the account with the Central Bank." What is especially alarming is that teenagers and students are increasingly among the victims. Izvestia figured out how this scheme works, why young people become easy targets, and what will help protect themselves.
How the scheme works
According to the press service of the Central Bank, the attackers contact the victims through popular messengers, posing as employees of "financial intelligence" or law enforcement agencies. They claim that a large-scale leak of personal and banking data occurred from the citizen's previous place of work. Further, the scammers report that the compromised information can be used to finance illegal activities, for which they inevitably face criminal liability.
To avoid problems with the law, the victim is urgently offered to "update the main account with the Central Bank," for which it is necessary to deposit funds to the account specified by the scammers, and necessarily through an ATM. The criminals explain this by saying that this way none of the bank employees will make mistakes, and outsiders will not find out about the operation. In the correspondence, the attackers additionally send video instructions, allegedly from the Central Bank, stylized as official materials. One victim was persuaded to transfer money by sending him an SMS confirming a personal appointment with the Central Bank of the Russian Federation from the short number 300 (the official number of the Bank of Russia).
In general, there are a lot of fraudulent schemes using ATMs. In Ufa, a 16-year-old schoolboy handed over 12.5 million rubles of parental savings to intruders acting under the guise of law enforcement officers: he opened a home safe, collected cash and currency, deposited part of the amount through ATMs to a "secure account", and gave part to a courier.
Similar incidents have been reported across the country. For example, a student from Krasnoyarsk gave away more than 10 million rubles of parental funds: fraudsters, posing as employees of the post office and the Central Bank, convinced her of the threat of criminal liability and forced her to withdraw deposits and transfer money through a fake application.
Alexey Drozd, head of the security department at Serchinform, points to the active use of artificial intelligence technologies by criminals. Fraudsters generate fake resolutions and letterheads of departments with banking details, seals and signatures in real time. Such visualization completely removes the victim's doubts about the authenticity of the attacker's words.
According to Sergey Trukhachev, head of the Smart Business Alert service, criminals have upgraded the classic legend by adding a mention of the official regulator to it to increase trust. He adds that the scheme deliberately restricts the victim's ability to contact third parties, which is a key element of social engineering.
Why have young people become vulnerable to tricks
Recently, there has been more and more news in the media that young people, teenagers and college and university students, are giving money to scammers. Recent examples include the case in Moscow when an 18—year-old student was persuaded to take out valuables worth over 80 million rubles from his home. Another 17-year-old resident of the capital, the son of a businessman, was forced to transfer over 200 million rubles from the family safe to criminals, acting under the control of fraudsters via video communication.
Young people spend a significant part of their time in a digital environment, so instant messenger communication seems natural and absolutely safe to them. The new generation has grown up in digital ecosystems and takes technology for granted, rarely understanding its internal structure. At the same time, they often lack practical experience in interacting with government regulators and large banking structures. Threats of criminal prosecution cause acute panic among the young audience, critically reducing the ability to objectively assess the situation.
Scammers take advantage of the emotional immaturity and high speed of decision-making that are characteristic of this age. Sergey Golovanov, chief expert at Kaspersky Lab, confirms that since the introduction of schemes with "secure accounts", there has been a noticeable shift in the activity of criminals towards teenagers aged 14-16. He attributes this trend to the fact that young people have not previously encountered such legends and do not have well-developed threat recognition skills. They simply don't have the experience to distinguish a real procedure from a fictional one.
"The new scheme is another version of the classic telephone fraud scenario," the source said. — For example, seven years ago, the attackers introduced themselves as employees of the Central Bank and talked about a "segregated account" that allegedly needed to be "urgently saved." In the new version, in addition to the legend of a "secure account," scammers send well-designed instruction videos in messengers. This creates a feeling in a person that he is really participating in some kind of official procedure, and reduces vigilance.
The press service of the RCN told Izvestia that information is received almost daily about citizens who become victims of fraudsters posing as employees of banks and departments. The attackers skillfully mislead the victim and force them to perform the actions they need. As a result, the victims suffer significant financial losses.
— Young people tend to trust scammers, as the latter use the authority of the authorities, fear of financial losses and threats to the victims' loved ones. In addition, unlike older generations, communication and receiving services in a digital environment are more familiar and natural for young people compared to personal communication, they said.
An additional vulnerability factor is the access of young people to large sums of money, usually belonging to their parents or other relatives.
How to protect yourself from this
It is necessary to firmly know and always remember that the Central Bank does not open accounts to individuals. Employees of government agencies and financial organizations never call citizens with a request to transfer money somewhere. They also do not communicate with the public via messengers and do not require confidential transactions. Kirill Levkin, Softline Group Project Manager, emphasizes that the key feature of the scheme is a combination of social engineering and pseudo-legitimacy.
He emphasizes that, unlike classic phishing, there is no hacking, and the victim transfers the money himself, believing that he is acting according to the instructions of the state. An effective method of protection is considered to be the so-called security pause, which does not allow making financial decisions under pressure. If there is the slightest doubt, it is necessary to immediately interrupt the dialogue and contact the bank independently using the official numbers. It is also worth limiting the disclosure of personal data and setting up mandatory notifications for all financial transactions.
Kaspersky Lab advises you to remember that employees of banks and government agencies never ask you to transfer money to "secure accounts." Any such call or message is a reason to end the conversation immediately. It is always important to double-check information through official contacts, keep in mind that deception schemes are often multi-stage, and use caller ID for additional protection.
Izvestia sent a request to the Ministry of Finance, but no response had been received at the time of publication.
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