From son to bell: crooks attack schoolchildren before state exams
On the eve of the main period of passing the OGE and USE, criminals profit from the anxiety of parents and graduates and the fuss associated with the organization of graduation parties. Izvestia analyzed the most popular schemes of deception on the threshold of obtaining matriculation certificates.
Lessons of Lies
Malefactors actively use the field of tutoring as a cover. They create colorful ads about "secret techniques," "unique answer databases," and "guaranteed results" in exams. The victim is then lured to a phishing site, ostensibly to pay or join classes, the Safe Internet League said in a statement.
By clicking on a link from an SMS or messenger, the parent enters their bank card details, logins from Gosuslug or the school's personal account. As a result, either the money is immediately debited from the victim's account, or the attackers get full access to personal data for further fraud.
The bouquet is a ghost
Before exams, the demand for flowers is traditionally growing, which is used by scammers posing as florists. Bouquet delivery market experts have recorded an increase in the number of fake ads on social networks and messengers. But the thieves lurked among the subscribers of the official channels of the stores.
Natalia Kanunnikova, a representative of the MotleyGrass bouquet delivery company, told Izvestia that the deception scheme looks extremely simple: only payment instruments for a fake person are among the tools.
— In the Telegram channel, buyers can ask the price or terms of purchase in the comments. This is used by scammers. They write to potential customers on behalf of sellers and ask them to transfer money to a personal card. Then they disappear," Kanunnikova explained.
The parents of graduates transfer an advance payment for an "exclusive bouquet", and on the day of the holiday they remain without flowers and without money. The "seller", of course, blocks all contacts.
Fussing with the photographer
Another headache for parents is the preparation of photo albums. There is also a "minefield" here: the wrong movement, and the parents' common money goes to the crooks. Moreover, the amount of fees for such products today reaches several hundred thousand rubles.
— This is a seasonal crime, most often the total money can be appropriated by an unscrupulous member of the parent committee, — an operative of the metropolitan police told Izvestia. — Or the school encounters crooks who collect orders, take an advance payment and disappear with it.
In addition, parents benefit by providing substandard services at an inflated price, and formally law-abiding citizens, such as photographers. It is even more difficult to bring them to justice.
— Even if you complain about such a would-be photographer to the police, the law enforcement officer is highly likely to refuse to initiate a case and invite the applicant to file a lawsuit in the framework of a civil dispute over the provision of substandard services, — says lawyer Ekaterina Krasnova. — And this is a troublesome and expensive business. Not everyone can handle such a lawsuit. This is what these kind of "specialists" are parasitizing on.
Almost a "felony"
As follows from the correspondence in the chat of the 9th grade of one of the capital's schools, which was reviewed by Izvestia, parents faced non-fulfillment of obligations on the part of photographer Vera G. The conflict illustrates the risks of making an advance payment and the lack of a transparent settlement scheme.
At the negotiation stage, the girl requested the entire amount for the services. As a precautionary measure, the parents offered to transfer the money directly to the printing company, bypassing the mediation of the photographer, and stated that they would pay for the services after the fact. However, Vera insisted on her own.
"She showed us the photos that were planned for the album, received an advance payment and stopped picking up the phone and answering messages," a source, a mother of high school students from the parent committee of one of the graduating classes, told Izvestia.
It was only after the girl was threatened with legal problems that, after graduation, she was forced to order the promised albums from the printing house. It turned out that she spent the money on the printing house on her own. In her defense, the photographer said that she was caring for a sick relative and was in a difficult financial situation.
Rental of accommodation
Another point of risk is booking a graduation venue. Prices bite, especially considering that all students graduate on the same day. This is used by outright scammers and unscrupulous realtors.
— As a rule, scammers, taking advantage of the increased demand at the end of May, create one—time accounts in popular ad services and offer accommodation facilities at modest prices, - said a source in the Moscow police. — The main task is to get a person to communicate outside the site. The next step is to take an advance payment. People do this despite the risk — they are afraid to miss the opportunity, as the demand for suburban accommodations on these dates is exorbitant, especially among schoolchildren from the metropolis.
A new trend among unscrupulous realtors is a decoy advertisement for a country house for the celebration of teenagers.
— One of the parents posted a tempting advertisement in the chat about renting a beautiful spacious cottage in the Moscow region for only 21 thousand rubles on our dates. We decided to book through the service, then we thought to call there. It turned out that this house was actually unavailable, and the realtor offered us about the same option starting from 150 thousand rubles. In fact, this is an unfair way to promote your services," said a parent from Moscow.
No panic, no prepayment
Konstantin Parfenyev, an expert in the field of IT security, told Izvestia how not to become a victim of scams during the pre-examination period. According to him, the main weapon of scammers now is psychological pressure and haste.
— In any scheme, whether it's a fake tutor or a flower seller, scammers put pressure on the same thing: lack of time and parental anxiety for the child's future. "There are almost no seats left," "the last bouquet," "discount only today," are classic triggers, explains Parfenyev.
The expert advises first of all to check the address bar, not the design of the site: phishing pages look like exact copies of real ones, but the domain will always contain an error or a strange zone like .ru.com . If the site asks you to enter your card details "for verification" before a free lesson, you should close it immediately. It is also important to look at the lifetime of a Telegram account: a bot or channel created two weeks ago cannot be a reputable store. The real seller has a publication history of at least six months.
Parfenyev categorically does not recommend transferring money to a personal card: if the "seller" from the comments asks to send the amount to an individual, this is most likely a fraudster. A self-respecting company operates through a checking account or offers payment upon receipt. In addition, the expert reminds that the purpose of scammers when phishing tutors is often not a thousand rubles per lesson, but access to an account on Gosuslugi or in a mobile bank. If, after entering the data on a suspicious website, you receive an SMS with a code that you did not request, you must immediately block the card through the bank's application.
Finally, Parfenyev advises turning off emotions and using the "five-minute rule": at a time when scammers are pushing and rushing, it's worth taking a break. During this time, you can find the real company's website through a search or call a real number.
— Scammers don't like to wait and just switch to another victim, — the expert summarizes.
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