Broker scams Yekaterinburg teacher using British model photo

«— How many times I«ve fended off scammers: various majors from the MVD, FSB, fake MFC employees asking for codes. I remember once they call: you need to update your data, and I tell them: send a notification by Russian Post. It takes long? I»m in no hurry. In short, I thought I knew everything about fraud schemes. But I had not heard of «my» scam.»

Oksana, a teacher by education, recently became a victim of scammers. She was duped by fake brokers. She lost 1.5 million rubles (about $16,700) and fell into debt with microfinance organizations at huge interest rates.

Broker Anton Viktorovich and trainings

It all started with correspondence on the VKontakte dating service. His name was Kirill Livensky, 46 years old, the same age as Oksana, in the photo he was wearing a jacket and looked serious. In early September, the man wrote to her from his page.

— He said he had a car-related business. That he himself is also from Yekaterinburg, currently on a business trip in St. Petersburg, but will return soon, and «we will definitely meet,» Oksana says.

So they started communicating. Kirill told Oksana that besides cars, he also makes money on cryptocurrency. He offered to let her try it. Oksana is a teacher by profession, at that time working as a methodologist at an educational institution, she knew little about cryptocurrency: only the most general — that it«s bitcoins.

At first Oksana refused, explaining that she didn«t understand, but he convinced her it was nothing complicated. It was somehow awkward to refuse, because their first date was supposed to happen very soon. Kirill was literally returning to Yekaterinburg from a business trip in a few days and had already «reserved a table for dinner» at a restaurant in Vysotsky.

Kirill explained the first steps on the crypto exchange: you need to deposit $200 — 10,000 rubles ($111), purchase cryptocurrency for that amount. Oksana transferred the money to a personal card of some Anastasia, bought crypto rubles, she was indeed opened a crypto wallet, sent links to «Mex» and «Ox» — these are cryptocurrency exchanges. Oksana continues:

— And then Kirill told me that he has an acquaintance broker Anton Viktorovich from Moscow, very advanced. He is just recruiting a group and conducting training.

Oksana tried to refuse again: she said she didn«t need it, but in the end she became a student of Anton Viktorovich. The group of novice brokers was on Telegram. Besides Oksana, two girls from Moscow with flashy photos on their avatars and a young man from Dagestan were also taking the training.

The training began, the sessions started. Anton Viktorovich explained in «circles» about exchanges, levels, rate drops, told about bitcoins — for Oksana all this was new.

She communicated with Anton Viktorovich personally in the messenger. He sent her his photo, told her he was 35 years old. They often talked on the phone there, he always called himself, his phone number was hidden, and their mutual acquaintance Kirill suddenly disappeared from the scene, the date at the restaurant never happened. He wrote to Oksana that he had been hacked by scammers and deleted his VKontakte page.

Oksana tried to find out from Anton where Kirill had gone, but he knew nothing: they were not close acquaintances, he was just one of his many partners. And the Yekaterinburg woman continued the training. However, at some point she became suspicious that Anton in the photo he sent her did not look like himself in the circles from the trainings — as if they were different people. But he reassured her: the photos were old. The studies continued.

Anton explained: to start making money on the exchange, you need to buy cryptocurrency for at least 300,000 rubles ($3,300), but preferably for 500,000 or 800,000 rubles ($5,600 or $8,900).

How the deception scheme was set up

Oksana gave in to the «broker«s» persuasive words, took out a bank loan for 311,000 rubles ($3,500) secured by her apartment. She expected to pay it back in a few days. Anton explained that dividends would accrue during that time and she could withdraw 500,000 rubles ($5,600).

Oksana exchanged rubles for cryptocurrency at a completely legal exchange office in Yekaterinburg on Dekabristov Street. The address was sent to her by Anton. She went there with her passport, the rubles were transferred to her crypto wallet. All this lulled the woman«s vigilance.

— In a few days I was going to withdraw the money along with the dividends, I needed to pay off the loan urgently. Anton warned: before withdrawing money, you need to go through a «verification procedure» — confirm that I am who I say I am. An employee of the international transfer commission, as he introduced himself, called me. He said I needed to answer their questions. He asked how I opened the wallet, whether there was any coercion, what payment systems I use — Oksana answered all the questions, but she was told she did not pass the procedure. When asked what to do, they replied that she needed to conduct a certain «holding procedure.»

Holding — a temporary freeze of money on the card before its final debiting. In this case, the scammers simply misled the victim with smart terms.

For the «holding procedure» she needed to deposit 200,000 rubles ($2,200) into the crypto wallet. Oksana collected this money from her credit card and borrowed from friends. She didn«t tell anyone, Anton Viktorovich warned that disclosing information to third parties was prohibited. She exchanged 200,000 rubles for crypto again through the city exchange office and put it into her crypto wallet.

— And then I did everything according to the instructions — through screen sharing in the messenger during personal communication. He says: now we log into «Ox» and «Mex», transfer crypto rubles from the wallet, now we request the path to withdraw money, I did everything according to his instructions... — Oksana says.

The «screen sharing» feature allows one of the chat participants to show their screen to all others. It is convenient for work (for example, to give a presentation), but scammers actively use this feature. Screen sharing should not be enabled when communicating in messengers with people you do not know personally. This is how scammers gain access to your personal data.

After the «holding,» there was again a failed «verification,» and then Oksana was told she needed to «conduct a mirror transaction» — this time for 500,000 rubles ($5,600).

A «mirror transaction» is a fraudulent scheme. The victim is offered to make a second payment for the same service or asset that they have already purchased or invested in. In crypto exchanges, the victim is assured that they did something wrong during the exchange, for example, chose too small a commission fee, and the money got stuck. They need to repeat the operation, only with a larger commission.

In schemes with investment platforms, scammers offer to make another payment to receive the promised income, but after the new payment, the victim can no longer access their investments. Pseudo-brokers who supposedly help withdraw funds, take money from the victim for withdrawal, then assure that the payment did not go through, got stuck somewhere, and offer to make the payment again for the same amount.

Oksana was not alone with her problems. The other training participants also could not pass the «verification.» Everyone shared their plans on where they would borrow and get money. But then joyful messages came that they had succeeded and withdrawn «money with dividends.»

Oksana, however, was panicking, she no longer needed any «dividends,» she begged just to get back the money she had already invested to urgently pay off her debts. But the next «international transfer specialist» who called her insisted that this was not possible. He said that to withdraw she needed to deposit another amount.

— I called Anton again, I said: this looks like a rip-off, — Oksana still didn«t suspect Anton at the time, — he reassured me: don»t worry. He had wormed his way into my trust. He said: I«ll come to you soon, I like you, I broke up with my girlfriend, I need a homemaker. To help me, he supposedly deposited his 60,000 rubles ($667) somewhere into my accounts, then told me that he was blocked on the exchange because of it, and it was unknown when he would be unblocked. He complained that he had only 100,000 rubles ($1,100) left, enough for only three days, and didn»t know how to live on. Then, to help, he sent me a huge list of microcredit organizations: let«s try to take a loan there.

In the end, Oksana took out microloans from 23 organizations on the «broker«s» list. In total, over three weeks of the «exchange course,» she lost 1.5 million rubles ($16,700), transferred them into crypto, and sent them somewhere according to Anton»s instructions.

When there was nowhere left to borrow, Anton urged her to ask her parents to take out a loan for Oksana for another «holding procedure»; fortunately, she flatly refused. After that, the «broker» disappeared from contact, and the training chat vanished. The woman finally realized that all those Moscow beauties and the guy from Dagestan were a setup, and that scammers were behind it.

A repairman from Siberia and a British model

Oksana went to the police. A criminal case was opened under the article «Fraud,» and she was recognized as a victim. She provided the police with screenshots of the correspondence and photos of Kirill and Anton. The police, by the way, suggested that all the images were made using a neural network. However, it turned out that the scammers didn«t bother much with AI.

We checked the photos ourselves through open sources. «Kirill» turned out to be the owner of an apartment renovation company from Omsk, an athlete and family man. Apparently, the photo was stolen from his open VKontakte page. The broker «Anton Viktorovich» is a British model named Samuel Zinkevich, who advertises underwear, T-shirts, and other clothing on his social media. And the «circles» in the chat were likely downloaded from some other broker resource; they contained only general information about exchanges. The fake broker gave instructions only in personal communication in the same messenger.

Now Oksana«s next stage of troubles has begun. Debt collectors started hunting her. In the first months, she tried to pay somehow — sometimes 5,000 rubles ($56), sometimes 10,000 rubles ($111).

To get out of the debt hole, Oksana started working as a cleaner, washing entrances. She started making homemade sweets for sale.

— I lived on 500 rubles ($6) for a week, stretching a pack of pasta over several days. Due to stress, all old diseases worsened, consequences of previous sports injuries: I was into cross-country skiing. My back wouldn«t straighten, but I had to wash the floors.

Luckily, the owner of the cleaning company where the woman worked part-time, upon learning of her plight, helped — offered a position as an assistant. They were just looking for a deputy, and Oksana has two higher educations. She left the college to at least pay the monthly 60,000 rubles ($667) on the bank loan secured by her apartment. But paying all the MFOs was unrealistic. Overdue payments began.

Moreover, according to the Yekaterinburg woman, several microfinance organizations that she had never even applied to demanded debts from her. The amounts there are very small, but the interest and penalties are huge. This really happens when people have loans foisted on them covertly using their passport data. And Oksana had sent the scammers a scan of her passport and her photo for the «verification procedure.»

She sent the MFOs documents proving she is a victim in a criminal case. Several organizations reviewed the application and ruled in her favor: they conducted an investigation and stopped collection. But some MFOs transferred the debts to collectors. Threats began, calls to her bosses at work, they found the phone numbers of her acquaintances and friends. Meanwhile, penalties and interest keep growing.

Where to complain about debt collectors

We sent information about the actions of the collectors to the Bailiff Service of Sverdlovsk Oblast, and they have already contacted Oksana. We explain that you can file a complaint specifically with the bailiffs about possible illegal actions of debt collectors.

The Federal Bailiff Service maintains a register of collection agencies and is authorized to conduct inspections based on citizens« complaints. The law clearly stipulates the number of permitted calls per day: relatives, colleagues, and acquaintances may be called no more than once to clarify the debtor»s contact information. However, threats and damage to property already constitute a criminal offense, and are handled by the police.

Police comment

The Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for Yekaterinburg reported that they are investigating a criminal case on fraud.

The police also once again remind that scammers constantly change their methods of deception, but despite all the sophistication of the fraudsters, they can be countered with the simplest rules:

Do not talk to strangers on the phone.

Do not disclose any personal data or codes to outsiders.

Do not transfer or give money to unknown persons.

Double-check all information you receive by phone personally.

We also reported on how a medical worker from Yekaterinburg lost two apartments after talking to «Moscow police.» He was scammed using a standard scheme — by the way, they also asked for a «mirror transaction,» so if you hear such an offer on the phone, just hang up.