Telephone scammers posing as representatives of a mobile operator and the State Control Committee swindled 124,000 rubles from a Gomel resident.
Following the scammers’ instructions, the Gomel resident sold her car, took out loans and gave the money to her employer.
This was reported by the press service of the Investigative Committee for the Gomel Region.
How the scammers operated
According to the investigation, at the end of August of this year, an unknown subscriber with the avatar of a mobile operator called a 56-year-old woman from Gomel in a messenger.
Introducing himself as an employee of this operator, the caller offered the woman to remotely renew the contract for the provision of telecommunications services.
Following the instructions, the Gomel resident followed the link and filled out the form, indicating her passport details.
Soon she received a call in a messenger from an alleged employee of the State Control Committee. The interlocutor told the woman that she was a defendant in a criminal case on financing extremist activity. To make the story more convincing, the fraudster sent a photo of a fake service ID.
The Gomel resident denied the accusations and spoke about the call from the mobile operator employee and the provision of personal data.
The “KGC employee” changed his tone and told the woman that fraudsters would try to take out loans in her name and that she needed to act proactively.
Following his instructions, the Gomel resident took out several loans and transferred money to other people's accounts. The woman was also forced to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
Then the “KGB employee” forced the Gomel resident to sell her Renault Logan and transfer the proceeds to a “safe” account.
The next target of the scammers was the Gomel resident's apartment. The woman could not find a buyer, and the scammers forced her to take out a loan using the apartment as collateral.
Having swindled a total of at least 46,000 rubles from the Gomel resident, the scammers did not stop.
The apogee of the charlatanism was the fabrication about a virus on the woman's work computer. Trying to save her employer's money, the Gomel resident transferred 78,000 rubles to "safe" accounts.
The next day, the “KGC employee” told the woman that she would not be getting her money back.
The Gomel city department of the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case on this fact under Part 4 of Article 209 of the Criminal Code (fraud on an especially large scale).
