Telephone scammers have moved and rebuilt

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In 2022, telephone scammers also began to use investments in crypto assets for their own purposes. "The attack scenarios have changed in accordance with the current information agenda. These are primarily sanctions, restricting banks' access to the SWIFT payment system and various offers to invest in cryptocurrency to save money. As before, scammers target ordinary citizens who have a bank account, using their natural desire to save their savings in the malaysia cell phone number list face of inflation and an unstable international situation," - this is how Sergey Voldokhin, Director of Antiphishing LLC, sees changes in the scammers' work scenarios. At the same time, as Oleg Sedov, Director of Development of the Cybersecurity for the Population Department of RTK-Solar, noted, telephone scammers use cryptocurrencies to withdraw funds stolen from Russian citizens, including cryptocurrency.

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At the end of February, the activity of telephone scammers against residents of Russia and Russian-speaking residents of other countries practically came to naught. Experts attribute this to the fact that most of the criminal call centers were based in Ukraine and their "work" was affected by the start of the special operation. However, already in the second half of March, they became active again, and the attack scenarios were adapted to the current agenda. Some experts believe that the scammers have restructured themselves, transferring their "business" to other regions, one of which could be the Baltics.

However, according to Alexander Gostev, the circulation of cryptocurrency within the country is prohibited in Russia, and it is outside its borders that Russians make up a fairly significant share of cryptocurrency owners: "In this regard, the characteristic point is that the victimized user is unlikely to contact the law enforcement agencies of the Russian Federation and will most likely seek protection in other countries from foreign lawyers. But all these cases are not advertised."

According to Yaroslav Kargalev, phishing is actively used to steal crypto assets, and there is a clear upward trend both in Russia and around the world: "We are seeing an increase in phishing resources aimed at stealing crypto wallets. According to our statistics, in 2022, 4.6% of the total number of phishing sites were aimed at crypto wallets, while in mid-2021 they accounted for only 1.4%. More and more countries are legalizing or launching their own digital currencies, which leads to their even greater penetration into people's lives. Fraudsters will take advantage of this. If nothing changes dramatically, then in the coming months we will be faced with phishing attacks modified to steal cryptocurrencies both in Russia and around the world."