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In the Republic of Belarus there is an increase in crimes committed using information and communication technologies against employees of institutions (enterprises) of education, healthcare, agriculture, industry and other organizations.

It has been established that attackers study group messaging tools (chats) in various instant messengers used by employees of such institutions for communication, identify the accounts of managers, create copies of their accounts and enter into personal correspondence with other participants in such chats.

During the correspondence, posing as a manager, the attacker provides fictitious information that the employee was interested in law enforcement officers (he names the data of these “employees”) and insists on maintaining the confidentiality of the fact of the request. This psychological technique in a number of cases reduces the level of a citizen’s critical assessment of the subsequent actions of criminals, ensuring unquestioning execution of instructions received from them.

Next, the citizen receives calls via instant messengers or telephone calls from supposedly law enforcement officers, as well as banking institutions, in some cases with demonstration of photographs of fake official IDs via messengers. During the conversation, pseudo-employees convince you of the need to take certain actions, including transferring funds under various fraudulent pretexts.

Such pretexts for committing theft of funds may be:

• participation in a special operation to capture “criminals” who are allegedly trying to steal money using a citizen’s accounts or on his behalf;
• availability of information about a citizen allegedly committing criminal financial transactions, in order to remove suspicion of which it is necessary to take the required actions;
• a planned search at a citizen’s place of residence in order to identify and seize undeclared cash.

Having convinced the employee of the institution (enterprise), organization of the legality of his actions, the caller offers to transfer cash to the intermediary or deposit it into the bank accounts indicated by him, transfer funds from bank accounts, including by applying for loans in his name for these purposes, provide details your bank cards, authentication data for access to bank accounts, codes from received SMS messages, etc.

When receiving such messages in instant messengers, you must:

• check that the corresponding account belongs to the person whose name the account is named and (or) whose photo is present in the profile;
• do not disclose bank card details, authentication data for access to bank accounts, or codes from incoming SMS messages sent to personal subscriber numbers to anyone;
• immediately inform the heads of institutions about identified attempts to take measures to prevent such actions and law enforcement agencies to respond.