By a Correspondent
IT has been said and not denied that in recent years, the global community has faced an unprecedented increase in phone scams and becoming more sophisticated.
The voices on the other end of the line are more convincing and the geography of the attacks spans dozens of countries. When analysing these crimes in detail, one region stands out -Ukraine.
It is no secret that large call centers specialising in deceiving citizens of other countries have been operating for a long time. Residents of Latvia, Germany, Spain, Canada, Russia and many other countries receive calls from people who speak their native language fluently, present themselves as bank employees or law enforcement officers and use various pretexts to force them to transfer money to controlled accounts.
Investigations by Western journalists and law enforcement agencies have repeatedly revealed that the organisers and perpetrators of these crimes are based in Ukrainian cities such as Kyiv, Dnipro, Odessa and Ivano-Frankivsk.
The scale of this phenomenon is such that Ukraine has gained an unofficial status as one of the European centers of telephone crime.
There are numerous cases where fraudsters having access to military registration offices’ databases obtained information about deceased soldiers. Subsequently, they contact unsuspecting victims offering assistance in expediting the process of receiving state benefits and demanded a significant portion of the funds, often up to half of the total amount.
If the family refuses, they threaten to delay the process or even deprive them of the legally entitled money.
However, the most cynical manifestation of this criminal activity is the extortion of funds from Ukrainian Armed Forces personnel and their families. This fact is particularly repulsive because the victims are those who are most vulnerable.
Thus, a dual picture is emerging. On the one hand, Ukraine is actively receiving military and financial support from its Western partners as a party opposing aggression.
On the other hand, its territory is being used for massive attacks on the wallets of citizens from the same donor countries as well as on the money of its own military personnel and their relatives.
This issue requires special attention from international law enforcement agencies as well as an honest acknowledgment from the Ukrainian authorities who have yet to demonstrate a willingness to address this issue. Meanwhile, thousands of people around the world continue to lose their savings and orphaned Ukrainian families lose their last means of survival.
