Fraudsters forged a message from the creator of the rock opera “Juno and Avos” Alexei Rybnikov and stole 4 million 09.14.2023, 16:15

A famous composer and producer unwittingly caused damage to his theater. Alexey Lvovich created a Telegram account and happily forgot about it. Fraudsters took advantage of this, hacked the site and gained unlimited access to contacts in Rybnikov’s circle. As a result, the famous artist “helped” cheat the employees of his own theater for almost four million rubles.

The chief accountant of the Gradsky Hall Theater, Elena Goldberg, fell for the hacker’s bait. In the morning, she received a message from the art director via messenger. The woman did not even doubt the authorship and took everything at face value. Fraudsters on behalf of the winner of the state financier award warned that a curator from the capital’s Ministry of Culture would contact her and provide further instructions.

After some time, a man actually called Elena, but he introduced himself as an employee of the Federal Security Service. Further, the speaker acted in a well-regulated laugh and was so convincing that the financially savvy employee of the theater had no suspicions – she was quite sure that she was communicating with the creator of the rock opera “Juno and Avos” and a law enforcement officer whom the boss trusted.

A fake FSB officer told Goldberg that financial criminals were trying to get large loans for her – she had to outrun them. The spokesperson further said that a car with a trusted driver will arrive for the chief accountant and take her to the required bank branch. There, Elena had to apply for a loan of 5 million rubles and transfer these funds to a verified secure account, the Baza Telegram channel reports.

Such a scheme, as assured by the interviewee, would help prevent theater losses. Elena received the details and was able to transfer most of the amount using them. Only when she had 1.1 million left in her account did she realize: something is wrong here. The accountant realized she was the victim of a classic scam and called the real security forces. On the basis of this fact, criminal proceedings were initiated.

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