Fraudsters have become increasingly active with the “fake boss” scheme

Since the beginning of October 2025, a tenfold increase in fraud attempts in instant messengers using fake accounts of famous people has been recorded.

Fraudsters create fake pages for government officials, CEOs and top managers of companies and other famous personalities. The most popular scheme is “fake boss” or an alleged message on behalf of the manager. Stanislav Kuznetsov, Deputy Chairman of the Board of Sberbank, told reporters about this on the sidelines of the international forum “Dialogue on Fakes 3.0”.

The first and last name on the fake page matches the data of the real person, and his profile contains his photograph. Mailings are sent both to acquaintances, including colleagues, and to strangers with whom a famous person whose name is used for deception may potentially be close by occupation. Fraudsters collect data from open sources and in the shadow segment of the Internet (darknet).

The most popular scheme is the “fake boss”, when a pseudo-leader sends a message about an imminent call from a “curator” – supposedly an employee of law enforcement agencies and security forces. As a rule, the message intimidates with a serious check or investigation; scammers may send fake documents as confirmation. Then the “curator” lures out personal and business confidential information and offers to “protect” their savings – transfer them to a “safe account” or transfer them to a drop courier.

At the same time, if previously the targets of “fake boss” schemes were primarily employees of financial departments and accountants in order to lure out company funds, now scammers send such messages to a wide audience, appealing to the status and authority of famous personalities.

“The best precaution in this case is the ability to critically assess the situation,” warns Stanislav Kuznetsov. — If you received a message supposedly from a well-known person, but have never communicated with him personally before, or if it concerns monetary transactions, collection of personal or confidential information, or threats, there is a high probability of encountering scammers. Fake accounts often have characteristic features that are difficult to hide: it is important to pay attention to the date the account was created and when the username was last updated. This will allow you to identify a potentially dangerous profile in time and avoid the risks of becoming a victim of fraudulent schemes. For your own safety, we recommend that you immediately report suspicious accounts to the messenger support service in order to prevent further activity by criminals.”