"I need fifteen intercom keys." How people make scammers swear and hang up

Katsiaryna's father-in-law was targeted by phone for almost two hours, the girl says. They called from a regular Belarusian number, clarified a tariff plan change at "Beltelecom," and the man provided his passport data.

— The next day, they started calling via Viber (and tried via Telegram too): a person in uniform, in an office, against the background of the Belarusian flag, spouting legal terms. They accused my father-in-law of transferring money to terrorists from his account.

Павялічыць

The standard scheme: "you have become an accomplice, now you will be punished according to the Criminal Code." They started asking how much money was in the bank, how much cash was at home, demanded access to the account, and to declare cash.

What saved them was that the family regularly talked to the man about scammers — when the fraudsters started to trick him into revealing the CVV code of his card, Katsiaryna's father-in-law finally turned off his mobile phone and called her from his home phone.

Павялічыць

— I arrived, we turned on his phone — the call came immediately. The "comrades" started intimidating me, saying that I was now also under investigation. But as soon as I unleashed my skill in age-old swearing, they immediately realized they were exposed and even started laughing, saying they'd at least learn new words.

After that, I set up my father-in-law's phone so he wouldn't fall into such a situation again:

• Viber: disabled Viber-in calls, enabled protection from unwanted calls (at least there will be no call notifications, and he won't answer), enabled message requests in a separate folder (from unknown numbers).

• Telegram: in privacy settings, I set that all actions (calls, messages) can only be done by existing contacts. Since he is an elderly person, it is unlikely that new contacts will genuinely message him for business. I later set the same settings for my parents — this will at least somewhat protect them from unwanted calls. So far, no one has called after that.

"I will personally come and recheck what's wrong with the intercom"

Mikalai says: he immediately guessed that scammers were calling as soon as he saw the Russian number. He turned on the voice recorder and recorded this conversation:

— You will have a scheduled intercom replacement in your entrance tomorrow.

— In which city?

— In yours.

Павялічыць

Further in the conversation, a male voice threatens that Mikalai will be left without keys, and then will even face court.

— God forbid you break the intercom, we will sue. I will personally come and recheck what will happen with the new intercom.

— I'll be waiting for you.

The second time, the scammers stubbornly stuck to the same "intercom" scheme, and Mikalai decided to play along. To the question of how many keys he needed for the new device, the young man replied: eleven — saying, let there be some in reserve. The scammer, in turn, informed that, in addition to a set of keys, each resident of the house must also have an individual code for the intercom.

— For my apartment, please do not register any code.

— In that case, I'm sending you the number to get the keys from the master.

— Wait, correct that: not eleven — I need fifteen keys.

Here the scammer's script broke down, and he also hung up.

Mikalai says there was a third call — again about the intercom, but the young man was driving and couldn't talk.

— Apparently, the scheme works perfectly, that's why the scammers don't change anything in it, — Mikalai concludes.

Siarhei's wife received a call from an unknown number in a messenger. Siarhei recounts: his wife was doubtful, but decided it might be her cousin who had just gone to Russia. The girl answered the call and heard a young man's voice.

— Fluent, well-articulated speech, polite, addressing her by first name and patronymic. He asked why she hadn't picked up a message from the Ministry of Taxes and Duties at the post office.

Павялічыць

The girl agreed to pick up the document in the coming days, but doubts had already arisen in the family. Then the interlocutor began to clarify Siarhei's wife's passport data, and the young people were finally convinced they were talking to scammers.

— I loudly said near the phone: "These are scammers, hang up." My wife was about to drop the call and moved the receiver away from her ear, but that young man, hearing a male voice nearby, began to insult her.

Such a polite and intelligent young man instantly turned into a foul-mouthed person when he realized he was exposed and stood to gain nothing.

The number, of course, was immediately blocked, relatives and acquaintances were called and warned to be vigilant.

We have repeatedly told about multi-stage schemes, the first stage of which is a call from the post office. In Siarhei's case, the caller's number in the messenger was also identified as "Belposhta" (Belarusian Post). This is how scammers try to lull the "victim's" vigilance.

"Will collect money from other deceived people"

Journalists found out what to pay attention to and how to respond to calls if a presumed scammer calls, from Aliaksandr Ivanou, head of the internal security department of the Department of Financial Investigations of the State Control Committee.

Павялічыць

The name of this department is often used by fraudsters in their schemes: they understand how a call from the "Department of Financial Monitoring" or "Department of Financial Investigations" will affect an uninformed person.

The irony is that the State Control Committee does not deal with declaring money, collecting banknotes, and generally is not interested in how much money a person has at home (unless, of course, the person took a bribe).

— Very often, fraudsters introduce themselves as employees of the Department of Financial Investigations, the Department of Financial Monitoring, they may demonstrate an "office," credentials, and uniform. It might be unclear to a civilian that this is not the DFI uniform, and they will believe it.

But the main thing to remember is that employees of the State Control Committee or the Department of Financial Investigations do not conduct phone surveys, nor do they conduct investigations or operational work via phone calls.

— That is, if you received a call "from the State Control Committee" and they offer to help expose a criminal, take out a loan, transfer money — anything, never do it. Know that these are scammers on the line. If we do need you, you will be invited to the SCC and all information will be clarified on site, — says the representative of the department.

Павялічыць

One of the scam schemes involves fraudsters offering Belarusians to become "freelance inspectors or regional representatives of the State Control Committee" and carry out assignments, supposedly to join the ranks of the State Control Committee employees for an operation to detain fraudsters. But freelance and regional employees, curators, collectors, and other non-existent positions are only a figment of the perpetrators' imagination.

In reality, the "regional employee" will be turned into a courier who will travel around cities, collect money from other deceived people, and transfer it to the fraudsters.

— People write an application: "I ask to be employed by the State Control Committee." They are supposedly hired, an order is sent — obviously fake. Look here:

Павялічыць

Павялічыць

1. I see an outgoing number here from some phrase with the word "out." (исх.). Outgoing numbers exist only for letters, in an order — the number is without the word "out."
2. No order begins with the word "Dear."
3. "The duties of a regional representative include..." Again, duties are never listed in hiring orders. An official order is a brief administrative document that states that a person is appointed to a position, and that's it.
4. In the "order of the State Control Committee," there's the signature of the Chairman of the Board. We have the Chairman of the Committee.
5. The height of absurdity — the "order of the State Control Committee" has the seal of the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus.

This means that it is enough to carefully examine these "documents" to notice their implausibility with the naked eye. The slightest discrepancy should raise suspicions in a person: is this really the State Control Committee?

Павялічыць

— In this "order," there are the same blunders: again, "the duties of an employee of the collection service include...".

There are no collection officers in the State Control Committee.

In addition, Aliaksandr Ivanou believes that a hypothetical pensioner who has worked all his life, for example, as a locksmith at a factory, should probably wonder why he is being hired by the State Control Committee (and remotely at that) and how he can help the department.

Павялічыць

"Will you pick up a package from 'Riga' and avoid responsibility? That doesn't happen."

The head of the DFI department emphasizes: if you receive a call, especially in messengers, it's an immediate red flag and a reason to increase vigilance, especially if they ask you to do something.

— For example, they call and name you a participant in the financing of terrorism or accuse you of revealing state secrets. Well, you know whether you are participating or not, whether you know state secrets in principle or not — why panic?

• Firstly, you don't have to prove that you didn't finance anything.
• Secondly, the principle of inevitability of punishment applies. If a person has indeed become involved in financing terrorism or extremism, or committed other crimes, no employee of the State Control Committee or the DFI can exempt that person from responsibility.

Declaring, transferring for safekeeping, transporting packages from the "Riga" supermarket to Mogilev will not make you innocent.

In general, you shouldn't trust anyone. Even if there are some claims from a state body, the most important thing in such situations is not to make hasty decisions. Psychologists also advise this. The first step is to slow down or stop to engage critical thinking.

"If an employee shouts at you, they are definitely a fake employee."

If in doubt, Aliaksandr Ivanou advises calling back the department the scammer claimed to represent and clarifying whether such a person works there, or discussing the situation with loved ones, and doing so as soon as possible. By the way, you can also complain about inappropriate behavior of a real employee using the hotlines of state bodies.

— Our people are like: they get a call, someone introduces themselves as an employee — the person is already afraid of something. So, first and foremost, there should be curiosity, not fear: why are they interested in me? It's better to go and ask why I, a simple citizen, have interested financial intelligence, the KGB, the SCC.

— And fraudsters escalate the situation, threatening arrest, searches. If a search is truly necessary, they don't warn about it in advance, but they also won't use it to scare you. What, will they find a bomb at home? People should remember that law enforcement officers are obliged to treat people correctly and respectfully.

If they yell at you, put psychological pressure on you, it's immediately clear that the employee is fake.

"Almost sold her apartment secretly from her grandchildren"

However, the department's practice also includes stories with a happy ending. A representative of the State Control Committee recounts how once, scammers had been targeting an elderly woman for a very long time, convincing her that she was helping to expose criminals, while forbidding her to "disclose state secrets" and talk about this "operation."

The fraudsters convinced the pensioner to sell her apartment and transfer the money to a secure account. The woman had even signed a contract with a real estate agency, and several viewings of the apartment had taken place.

— Fortunately, her children somehow noticed something was wrong, realized they were scammers. They called me, saying: grandma seems hypnotized. And all of us together — the children, myself — spent over half an hour here, in the office, convincing her that it was all nonsense. Good thing she didn't manage to sell the apartment.

Another situation that ended well: a worker from Mogilev brought about 5-7 thousand rubles to Minsk for "declaration." What saved him was that the scammers "got carried away" and started redirecting him to various addresses.

— The man became suspicious, he called the internal security department, we offered him to come to us, and not to the address designated by the scammers. We convinced him that there were no such employees, no declaration whatsoever. It only cost him taxi expenses.

By the way, the Department of Financial Monitoring constantly recommends that Belarusian banks pay attention to clients who request a loan.

— A significant share of responsibility lies with the bank employee who interacts with the scam victim. It's clear that the person is behaving strangely, worrying, anxious. That's why we believe that a certain pause, a "cooling-off period," is needed before signing an agreement. And there are cases when bank employees find out the real reason for applying for a loan and dissuade people.

On the one hand, according to Aliaksandr Ivanou, fraudsters rely on people's legal illiteracy. On the other hand, among the couriers, there are not only deceived Belarusians. There are also those who consciously try to earn money in this way. Aliaksandr Ivanou reminds us of the main algorithm to follow if you are asked to participate in operational work, provide a code from an SMS, declare money, or perform other actions:

1. Do not provide callers with your personal data or codes.
2. Immediately hang up. The principle of "zero trust" should apply.
3. Discuss the situation with relatives and close friends, despite any demands from the fraudsters to keep it secret.
4. Under no circumstances take out loans at the request of third parties, do not transfer your money anywhere, and do not give it to unknown individuals.

For all doubts — contact the internal security department of the State Control Committee by phone 8 (017) 327-55-88 or the police.

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