Scammers have started using a new way to extort money from Russians: they hack users' accounts on social networks and оформляют them as pages of allegedly deceased people, RIA Novosti reported in the Digital Expertise Center of Roskachestvo. The goal of the criminals is to evoke sympathy and receive transfers from friends and acquaintances of the "deceased".
The scheme works as follows. Criminals select inactive accounts of older users, gain access to them, and change the information, creating the impression that the account owner has died. Then they analyze the list of friends, collect available phone numbers, and organize fundraising through popular banking applications, publishing stories with requests for donations for the funeral or assistance to relatives. Often, they gain access to banking services through front men.
Sergey Kuzmenko, head of the Digital Expertise Center of Roskachestvo, emphasized that scammers play on people's deep feelings - compassion and memory of departed friends, classmates or teachers. Criminals specifically choose those with whom the potential victim has not communicated for a long time in order to reduce the likelihood of a quick verification of information.
