Telephone scammers forced a pensioner from Vitebsk to put her apartment up for sale.
However, the scammers failed to deprive the elderly woman of her home, the press service of the Department of Internal Affairs of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee reported on Telegram.
How the scammers operated
A 73-year-old resident of Vitebsk received a call on the WhatsApp messenger (banned in Russia, owned by Meta, a company recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation) from an alleged representative of a mobile operator.
The caller told the Vitebsk resident that her tariff was outdated and that she needed to renew her contract.
Following the man’s instructions, the pensioner dictated her passport details and performed the necessary manipulations with the phone.
Immediately after this, the conversation stopped, and the phone began to act unusually and stopped turning off.
The Vitebsk resident became worried. The next morning, she received a call in the same messenger from a "major of the financial police."
The fake law enforcement officer told the woman that the criminals had used her passport details to take out a huge loan, which they transferred to Ukraine, and that she was facing a prison term for aiding terrorists.
The “major” also told the pensioner that she needed to sell her apartment to stop the scammers who had put her home up for sale with the help of black realtors.
The next day, the Vitebsk resident went to a real estate agency and put the apartment up for sale for $40,000.
However, in the evening the woman saw an article on the Internet about similar fraudulent schemes, realized that she was dealing with scammers, and contacted the police.
