A resident of Yekaterinburg, Anastasia Novoselova, was defrauded of 2 million rubles after falling victim to an elaborate scam that began with a phone call from a person impersonating an employee of “Russian Post.” The incident highlights the increasing sophistication of fraudulent schemes and the importance of vigilance.

The scam unfolded when Anastasia received a call from an unknown number, with the caller claiming to be from Russian Post. He informed her that a registered letter was waiting for her and instructed her to access a Telegram bot to obtain the address of the post office branch.

Within the Telegram bot, Anastasia was prompted to log in using her Gosuslugi (State Services) account. Upon entering her credentials, she received a notification that her account had been compromised and her money was being transferred to Ukraine.

Panicked, Anastasia contacted what she believed to be State Services, only to be transferred to a series of fraudulent individuals impersonating employees of the Central Bank and the police. These scammers manipulated her for nearly two weeks, convincing her to make repeated money transfers under the guise of resolving the issue and avoiding criminal charges.

The deception came to light when the individuals she was communicating with abruptly deleted the message history. Realizing she had been scammed, Anastasia is now burdened with 2 million rubles in debt, the incident occurring shortly before her birthday.

The Yekaterinburg police are currently investigating the case. The Ministry of Internal Affairs has issued a reminder to the public about the ever-evolving tactics of scammers and provided guidelines to avoid falling victim to fraud. These guidelines include avoiding conversations with strangers over the phone, never sharing personal data or SMS verification codes, refraining from transferring money to unknown individuals, and independently verifying any information received by phone.