Criminals are using a new fraud scheme to extort money from people who have lost funds in the stock exchange, Maria Rumyantseva, head of the digital communication and public relations department of the Association for the Development of Financial Literacy, has said in an interview with the Russian newspaper "Izvestia".

Fraudsters of these persons offer to return the money and thereby obtain their confidential financial information, extort money in exchange for their "services". According to her, they tell the victims that "to get the money back" they need to make an advance payment for the services or answer the questions of the "Central Bank inspector".

“However, the topic of advance payment is less common because it limits the potential income of the scammers to the amount they specify. The option is that the "inspector" conducts the conversation with the victim in such a way that the latter gives him confidential data, through which he gets access to his internet banking and the funds in it," explained Rumyantseva.

He noted that criminals do not have a client datebase of brokers, otherwise they would not try to find out if a given person has lost money on the stock exchange and would have known about these losses in advance. According to her, it is possible that the potential victim has chosen a different and inappropriate investment strategy, but in any case, he would like to have the funds returned.

Rumyantseva noted that according to the Moscow Stock Exchange, there are about 26 million private investors in Russia, and last year's systemic shocks led to significant losses for all clients.

"With this in mind, it is obvious that a person is likely to be targeted by fraudsters working on bank customer databases," she said, clarifying that those who have experienced large losses or in both absolute and relative terms may be exposed to the risk of losing a second time.

A user with the nickname Redhead83 confirmed that a large number of websites have appeared recently, where scammers promise to return "money stolen by brokers" through a "chargeback" (the procedure for disputing a payment by a bank card).