Scammers stole 158 million rubles from Nizhny Novgorod residents in a week.

      18 November 2025 17:53 Incidents

      Residents of the Nizhny Novgorod region have fallen victim to a large-scale wave of fraud. Over the past week, the region’s police recorded 95 crimes related to deceiving citizens. The total damage caused by the perpetrators amounted to 158 million rubles, the regional Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs reported.

      Most often the scammers used tried-and-true schemes: calls pretending to be from bank security services, fake offers of additional earnings, and fraud in online purchases.

      Thus, fraudsters called claiming to be bank employees 39 times, 22 cases involved fictitious online sales, and in 18 incidents the perpetrators convinced citizens to invest in investment schemes or cryptocurrency.

      One of the victims was a 39-year-old woman who for several months communicated with alleged financial consultants. They persuaded her to invest a large sum in cryptocurrency, assuring her that the risks were minimal and returns guaranteed. As a result, the woman took out a million-ruble loan, withdrew money from cards, borrowed 4.5 million rubles from acquaintances, sold an apartment for 11.9 million and transferred all funds, including personal savings, to the scammers’ accounts. The total damage amounted to 18,715,000 rubles.

      In another case a 35-year-old woman became interested in a social media offer to sell children’s tights. After she decided to buy 1,400 units of the product, she was persuaded to transfer 84,000 rubles as a prepayment. After the transfer the seller stopped responding.

      Another case involved a pensioner who received calls from someone claiming to be a representative of an exchange. He was offered to invest in cryptocurrency. At first the man transferred 50,000 rubles, then, following the “specialist’s” instructions, he transferred another 2.5 million rubles from his savings and borrowed 2.7 million from acquaintances. All the money was transferred through crypto exchangers to the scammers’ accounts.

      The police remind: do not trust strangers, do not transfer money without being completely sure of the reliability of the source, and if you have the slightest doubts seek advice from your bank or law enforcement agencies.

      Earlier it was reported that a pensioner from the Nizhny Novgorod region twice traveled to Moscow to hand over 1.8 million rubles to scammers.

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