How scammers operate on Avito - prepayment scam, delivery fraud

Fraud refers to the theft of other people's money through deception or abuse of trust. With the development of technology, scammers have moved to the Internet. It is easier to work online because of anonymity.

The Avito website is very popular. It allows you to sell things that have become unnecessary and buy anything at attractive prices. Of course, there are scammers on Avito. They work according to the same fraudulent schemes, which you need to know in order not to become a victim of scammers. Next, we’ll tell you how to recognize a scammer on Avito.

Scam on Avito - transfer money to card

Many people think that only sellers engage in fraud on Avito. This is wrong. There are many scammers among imaginary buyers. A favorite method of fraud on Avito is transferring money to a card. The scheme is simple: a buyer from Avito responds to an ad and says that he can transfer all the money for the goods to the card right now. Next, he uses all possible means to lure personal data from the seller. Moreover, the fraudster often only needs to know the card number, expiration date and the three-digit code indicated on the back.

With this method of fraud on Avito, such as transferring money to a card, the imaginary buyer flatly refuses to pay for the purchase by cash on delivery and is not particularly interested in the properties of the product. This should alert the seller.

A scammer on Avito asks for a card number

If scammers on Avito insist on transferring to a card, do not provide anything other than its 12-digit number. To send money to a card, the buyer does not need your full name or the expiration date of the credit card, especially since the code on the back is not needed. You are definitely dealing with a scammer if he demands to know the code from the SMS that came to your phone linked to the card.

Note!

Fraudsters may have two goals: to make purchases using your card in online stores (not all of them require a three-digit code, the number and expiration date are enough) or to log into online banking on your behalf.

The fact that it is scammers on Avito who are asking for a card number can be determined by the following signs:

• lack of interest in the product;
• desire to pay for the purchase immediately;
• categorical refusal of personal meeting and cash on delivery.

Scam on Avito with prepayment to the card

The most common method of fraud used by scammers on Avito is a scam involving prepayment to a card. It is also popular on other classifieds sites and online stores. Let's look at what the scam is on Avito with prepayment to a card. Under various pretexts, the fraudulent seller asks to transfer part of the cost of the goods to him. For example, a buyer became interested in an advertisement for the sale of a car. He calls the seller and finds out that there is already a line of people waiting for the car. To reserve a vehicle, you just need to transfer a ridiculous amount to the card - a couple of thousand rubles. Of course, a person who wants to buy a car at a profit agrees to a tempting offer, and in the end he is left without an advance payment and without a car.

It cannot be said that only scammers on Avito ask for a transfer to a card, but often this indicates the criminal intentions of the seller. In such cases, you need to ask for a personal meeting.

Note!

If the seller asks you to transfer money to your mobile phone, you are definitely dealing with a scam on Avito with prepayment.

Standard fraud schemes

The most common scheme for deceiving a buyer with the delivery of goods looks like this:

1. The scammer publishes an ad with a popular product in the mid-price category. For example, with the sale of electric scooters - they are popular in the summer.
2. By any means, he persuades a potential buyer for delivery. The pretexts can be different: I left the city during the pandemic or I’m just too busy and can’t come to the meeting.
3. After receiving consent, the scammer sends a fake payment link. The linked page is similar to the standard Avito form.
4. The victim pays for purchases and says goodbye to the money.
5. The scammer is trying to make more money by offering to return the payment. He sends the buyer a new form for a refund, but in reality he charges them again. The return page is the same payment page, but the text on the button has been changed from “pay” to “return”.

Below is an example of a fake page that a scammer might send. The domain mimics Avito, and the site itself is similar to the checkout page in an online store. Fake pages are often on the https protocol, and it is impossible to distinguish them by this feature. After filling out the data, the user is taken to the order payment page, where he is asked to enter his bank card information.

Fake product payment and refund pages

We block suspicious sellers. Therefore, in order to carry out such operations, scammers need to constantly create new accounts on Avito. They either register them themselves using SMS to a temporary virtual number, or buy stolen accounts. A virtual SIM card costs from 60 kopecks, someone else’s account on the shadow market costs from 10 rubles. The costs of both are incomparably less than even one-time income from deceiving users.

It was Avito Scam 1.0, but versions 2.0, 3.0 and even 4.0 have already appeared. These are not our designations - they are used by the scammers themselves.

They deceive not only buyers, but also sellers. The second diagram looks like this:

1. The buyer allegedly sent the money through a secure transaction.
2. He sends the seller a fake link where he can receive payment.
3. The seller is taken to a page that asks for his card details, and as a result, the amount is debited from his account.

The Scam 3.0 scheme works like this:

1. The seller publishes advertisements with activated delivery via Avito.
2. When the buyer pays for the goods, the scammer sends him a screenshot in which Avito allegedly asks for a confirmation code.
3. Using the code, the seller logs into the user's account. In the buyer’s profile, the scammer checks a box indicating that he received the goods. The buyer is left without money and purchase.

And the 4.0 scheme is arranged as follows:

1. The buyer pretends to have paid for the goods and sends a fake receipt. Receipts are sent anywhere: by email or via a third-party messenger. Depends on what contact the seller gave to the scammer.
2. The seller receives an SMS that mimics a transfer from the bank.
3. A few minutes later, the buyer writes that a product from another seller would be better suited for him and asks for a refund. The argument “return it, you’re not a fraudster” is often used. The seller sends the amount to the buyer, but from his own pocket, because there was no payment.

Avito - delivery scam

It often happens that the seller and buyer are in different cities. Of course, no owner would trust a stranger and send the goods to nowhere without money. Therefore, even conscientious sellers ask for advance payment. To check if you are dealing with delivery fraud on Avito, call the seller on behalf of the buyer from the same city and make an appointment. If he agrees, most likely you are dealing with a bona fide owner.

If you have friends in another city, ask them to pick up the goods and send them to you by mail. This method is much more reliable. Or agree with the author of the advertisement about delivery by courier service. In this case, the courier simply will not give you the goods until you pay for it. Both the seller and the buyer win. However, discuss in advance who will pay for delivery and which courier service will use it.

This is not a phone! This is a diamond!

Well, maybe we went too far with the diamond, but that’s for sure that it’s a stone. Often, instead of the promised product, you are sent something completely different from what was described in the ad. And if so, then the price differs from the declared one. So, instead of an iPhone, you will receive an old Nokia, instead of a purebred puppy, you will receive a mongrel with fake documents, instead of an ideal condition, you will receive a battered and worn-out item.

In order not to fall for this bait, ask the seller to photograph the item, record a video with it, call the seller and meet with him in person. Well, of course, discuss all the conditions before making a purchase. If you are in the same city as the seller, do not be lazy and do not be fooled by the “taxi that will bring you”. Come in person, inspect the item, turn it on, check and only then transfer money. And remember: free cheese is only in a mousetrap. A good thing is expensive.

First the chairs - in the evening the money. Don’t let yourself be deceived on Avito

Scammers on Avito via SMS

Sometimes scammers act not on behalf of the seller or buyer, but on behalf of the site administration. The person who posted the ad receives an SMS to the number with a link supposedly to the Avito website, which they need to follow. The reasons may be different: a blocked ad, a new response, etc. If you receive such a message, do not click on the link. Log into your personal account through a browser and check whether the account is really blocked or whether new responses have been received. Clicking on the link risks infecting your device with a virus and stealing passwords from online banking.

It would be a good idea to contact the Avito support service and report that fraudulent SMS messages are coming from a certain number.

Do you have any questions?

To get the most detailed advice on your issue, you just need to follow any of the suggested options:

• Request a consultation using the form
  on our website
• Or just call the number: 8 800 350-83-74

An epic battle between antifraud and scammers

We'll tell you what steps we took in the first months of 2020 to protect our users, and how the scammers responded.

The main metric we relied on to evaluate the effectiveness of our work was the number of support calls with delivery paid for by the scammer. We block most fraudulent ads before they even reach the site. But when almost all trade moved online, we recorded a surge in requests. This information is also confirmed by banks: in April and May they sent out massive warnings about the growth of fraud in online purchases.

To receive quick feedback on new tools, a person from our team infiltrated dozens of closed groups of scammers. In one of them, he passed an interview as a developer and gained access to the source code of scam bots, and also got into the group of organizers. Thanks to this, we always had fresh, first-hand information.

Understanding the risks due to the beginning of self-isolation, we began work before the active increase in requests. One of the first technical measures was the implementation of an anti-hack to snatch user accounts from the clutches of attackers. To do this, if the login and password were entered correctly, but the geolocation was suspicious, we requested a code from an SMS that was sent to the account owner. In response, scammers began registering more independent accounts. This works to our advantage - fresh seller accounts inspire less confidence in everyone.

Next, we started warning users about following suspicious links in the messenger. So we reduced the number of clicks by a third, but this had almost no effect on our main metric: those who were deceived by scammers were not stopped by any warnings.

Next we introduced a white list of links. We have stopped highlighting unknown links in the Avito messenger; you can no longer follow them in one click. When copying a suspicious link, a warning was also shown. This decision had a positive impact on our metrics for the first time.

We began to actively punish for the transmission of suspicious links in the Avito messenger: block or reject the seller’s advertisements. In response, scammers began to divert users from our chat to third-party instant messengers. Then we issued a warning not to switch to another messenger if you see it mentioned in the chat. This function started with a regular expression search, then we replaced it with an ML model.

Then scammers began to trick users into email. To do this, they needed the same thing we all need: trust. They began sending potential victims images where Avito allegedly requested the buyer’s email. This is a scam - we don't need buyers' emails.

Here our support supposedly replies that the buyer’s email is needed for delivery

And here in our interface there seems to be a new field for entering email

If someone else could distinguish a fake link, then the letter can be easily faked and is more trustworthy. We began deleting the email message and showing the user a warning about the dangers of such an action. If after the warning the user sends the email again, we no longer delete it.

Scammers have begun asking customers to send their email address in multiple messages or with the @ symbol replaced with something else. Then we began to display a warning even when requesting mail. The complex of these measures made it possible to almost completely prevent users from leaving the Avito messenger for mail.

Our current mechanics are quite effective, but not user friendly. The email message is deleted completely, and often contains other text. But it was the fastest and cheapest solution to develop. We are thinking about how to remake and improve it.

One of our latest initiatives is dialing the number. Typically, the numbers scammers use to register accounts do not last long. We call the seller's number after submitting an ad on Avito. If you can’t get through by phone, moderation will reject the ad. The scammers began changing the phone number immediately before publication so that we could call while it was still available.

And here is the feedback from the scammer

In suspicious cases, we lower the priority of the ad in the search results and remove it from recommendations. At the same time, we set a delay in issuing up to 48 hours in order to guarantee time to check everything carefully and cause a little more inconvenience to scammers.

How to recognize a scammer on Avito?

To avoid becoming a victim of fraud on Avito, carefully study sellers’ advertisements. It is better not to deal with recently created accounts, not to call on advertisements from other cities, as well as advertisements that do not have a photo of the product. You should be wary if the price is too low compared to the market price. A sign of a scammer on Avito is also a refusal to meet in person and a requirement to book the product by making an advance payment.

Another criterion is communication only by email or social networks. The account must contain the user's phone number. If he is unavailable for a long time or does not respond, this is a reason to be wary.

Note!

Please note any inconsistencies in the ad. For example, your profile may indicate the name Nikolai, but in fact you are communicating with a girl named Maria.

How to act to avoid scammers on Avito:

• ask to film the product;
• use cash on delivery;
• check prices.

Site overview

Avito is the most popular service in Russia for all kinds of advertisements/offers, services/products. It also operates outside our country, but within its borders it has tens of thousands of different offers in literally every city. It is extremely simple and clear to use, because everything simple is convenient, and what is convenient attracts much more visitors.

How to return money that I transferred to scammers on Avito?

We looked at how scammers operate on Avito. We will also touch on the question of what to do for a person who has already become a victim of scammers. As a rule, the first thing that victims are interested in is how to get money back from scammers on Avito. The method depends on how you transferred the money. If it is a mobile phone number, it is almost impossible to prove that it was an advance payment for the goods. Only contacting the police or a magistrate's court and investigating can help.

If a fraudster managed to hack your online banking account, and you did not give him passwords and account access codes, submit an application to the branch of the credit institution. The sooner you do this, the higher the chance of returning the money transferred to scammers on Avito. The same thing needs to be done if you transferred money to a scammer and only after that you realized who you were dealing with.

Note!

Returning money and canceling transactions is the right, not the obligation of the bank. The resolution of the issue remains at the discretion of the institution.

If you notice that money has been withdrawn from your card, immediately block the card by calling your bank. This way you will save the remaining funds.

If an advance payment is requested at a personal meeting, ask for a receipt. Without this document, it will be very difficult to prove the advance payment.

Be sure to report fraud to Avito support service. The site administration will block the account of the scammers and, if necessary, will assist the police in finding those who fraudulently received your money. In addition, by warning the portal management, you will protect other users from meeting scammers.

We will also consider where to go if you have suffered from scammers on Avito. File a police report. Please indicate:

• name of the police department;
• Full name of the boss;
• your data - full name, address, contacts;
• circumstances of the crime, amount of damage, actions of the criminals;
• all information about the attackers, including their full names, addresses, contacts;
• evidence of fraud;
• an indication that you are aware of the liability for false denunciation;
• date and signature.

Attach all available evidence - screenshots of correspondence, recordings of conversations with the scammer, checks, payment receipts. Collective statements are more effective in such cases, so it makes sense to find other victims of the actions of this scammer.

Scheme of “work” of scammers

Three groups of people are involved in the fraudulent scheme: workers, support, TS.

Workers, from the word worker, are the largest group of people, mainly schoolchildren and students. They independently create accounts on Avito and look for victims, who are called mammoths. Then, using social engineering skills, they convince victims to pay for something and send them a fake link. If the victim pays for the “goods,” then the workers’ task, with the help of support, is to transfer the victim to a refund, citing some kind of technical error.

Support are people who, for a fixed income, help newbie workers deceive users. They give advice, recommend “profitable” products, and are often willing to provide other services for a certain percentage of the fraudulent transaction, for example, preparing a passport in Photoshop, calling the victim, writing to her on behalf of technical support.

TS, from Topic Starter on shadow forums, where workers were initially hired, are essentially organizers. They download or buy software, which consists of two parts:

1. Telegram bot, which is the main tool of scammers. In it you can get a fake link to a product, receive notifications about clicks or payments.
2. Web version, which is responsible for displaying the payment/return/receipt page. A payment system for accepting payments is also connected to it.

The organizers make money from a percentage of each victim’s transfer, which is called profit. Therefore, they try to advertise their project and pay support to train newcomers. They also bear all the costs associated with the purchase of new domains and cards for which the money comes.

After looking at the source codes of many variants of fraudulent scripts, we came to the conclusion that most of them were written in PHP, but at a very poor level. Almost all scripts collect information about their users, including workers. One of the assumptions why they do this is that when law enforcement agencies contact the organizer, he will cooperate with the investigation and try to reduce the punishment as much as possible by revealing the workers.

In addition to scripts, scammers use bombers. These are bots that provide the opportunity to spam your phone with SMS and calls. Bombers work like this: they go to different sites and request registration or password recovery using a phone number. Usually scammers connect them to victims for 2-72 hours. And this is an important reason not to show your phone number on the Internet.

Some TS also hire developers who make improvements for the bot or website. For example, they improve worker ratings or protect scripts from vulnerabilities found in free versions. However, in pursuit of quick profits, the vehicle can take all the proceeds for itself, deceiving its own workers. At the same time, there is a group of guys who make money from the scammers themselves, tricking them into various services.

The average daily income of a fraudster-executor is 20,000 rubles, and that of a fraudster-organizer is 200,000 rubles.
The main thing to remember: despite the apparent impunity and benefits of “business”, all this activity falls under Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. Fraudsters are detained and given real sentences even in cases where the damage from deception amounts to 5-7 thousand rubles. We transfer all information we have about fraud to law enforcement agencies. We are convinced that despite the apparent profitability and ease of the scheme, our readers understand that only narrow-minded people who do not realize all the risks engage in fraud.

Punishment

The punishment for scammers on Avito depends on the amount of damage. If it is less than 1 thousand rubles, the fraudster faces sanctions under Art. 7.27 Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation. This includes a fine of up to five times the amount of the stolen property, arrest for up to 15 days, and compulsory labor for up to 50 hours.

For more serious consequences, the punishment will be criminal. The court may impose one of the following sanctions for divorce on Avito:

• fine up to 120 thousand rubles;
• compulsory work up to 360 hours;
• correctional labor for up to a year;
• suspended sentence or actual imprisonment for up to 2 years;
• arrest up to 4 months;
• forced labor for up to 2 years.

If the amount of damage is more than 5 thousand rubles. or a crime committed by a group of persons, fraudsters face:

• fine up to 300 thousand rubles;
• compulsory work up to 480 hours;
• correctional labor for up to 2 years;
• imprisonment for up to 5 years;
• forced labor for up to 5 years.

Note!

Damage of 250 thousand rubles is considered major. and higher. The fine in this case increases to half a million, and the prison term - up to 6 years. If the damage was particularly large (from 1 million rubles) or an organized criminal group acted, the attackers face up to 10 years.

Mafia of scammers

If someone has deceived the TS, if someone has harmed someone, then the sportsmen

, they find him and demonstratively shoot a video where they beat him and humiliate him in every possible way for deceiving his boss.

- In fact, if you just work as a worker, this is the same office work, it’s even carding. If you are at the initial stage, then this is an office job, a salary, but only with a huge risk of going to jail.

— They train in teams. They simply say which messages work on which site and where to look for potential mammoths. They teach how to get used to the role of the one they are playing.

- Let's say a woman who sells a stroller. Find a photo of the stroller you are selling somewhere. Find videos and play the role of the person who sells it

Karina Dubtsova (journalist) - Victim

—

I needed a phone. And I wanted it at an attractive price. I found an advertisement on Yulia. When we switched to personal messages, the girl, as it turned out, had left and could not personally give me the phone number, so a courier was needed.

—

She sent me a photo of herself with a passport, which calmed me down a little, although I had my doubts at first, there were suspicions. Then some strange requests began to transfer money to MTS Bank, to a Qiwi wallet.

—

As soon as I transferred half the amount, 12 thousand, the total price was 24, it slowly began to merge.

—

When I already wrote: listen, time is running out, let’s finalize the deal, she says: you know, I still doubt that you will transfer the money to me. What if you steal my phone? I say: apparently, you assume that I should snatch it from the hands of the courier, otherwise there is no other way.

—

Translate me the rest, then I will send you everything. Then I realized that clearly no one was going to bring anything, there would be no courier and no deal. Naturally, I didn’t translate anything else.

—

We talked, she blocked me everywhere. Naturally, I was unable to return anything because I transferred it to an electronic wallet. This is no longer possible. if you did it voluntarily, the bank can’t do anything. Qiwi does not provide any data.

Summary

Be careful when buying and selling goods on the Avito website. Follow our recommendations:

• do not provide card details, give the number only if you are sure of the seller or buyer;
• do not give out the card PIN code or the code sent via SMS under any circumstances;
• Be wary of refusals to meet in person and requests for prepayment.

If you have already become a victim of scammers, block cards and accounts that scammers may have access to, apply for a refund to the bank, contact the police, and, if necessary, contact an experienced lawyer who will ensure an investigation.

Story No. 1. Defenseless seller

I have a friend, let’s call him Ivan, who has been using Avito for a long time, buys and sells a lot on the service. Knows about all the different deception schemes during a personal meeting before buying/selling.

The person is very attentive and meticulous, so you will have to try very hard to deceive him. Why such a preface? So that you understand that the story told below happened to an experienced seller , and not to someone who was just on his first day on Avito.

A friend has another sale, the buyer asks to send the goods by Avito Delivery. Ivan packs the goods, takes a photo of the parcel and leaves the Russian Post. The buyer accepts the goods and for some reason refuses it, Ivan waits for the return delivery, and then goes to the post office again.

Parcel and box of chocolates

When he receives the parcel, he films the process of unpacking and receiving it on video and instead of a conventional smartphone, he sees there a package from the phone and candies stuffed into it .

Ivan is not at a loss, he asks the post office to issue an acceptance certificate with a description of everything that has arrived. Along with this act, a video of packaging and a video of unpacking, he is sent to Avito.Support, where he is asked to wait over and over again.

Acceptance certificate

A few months later, he is denied compensation because there is no video showing that it was the buyer who replaced the order. That is, even if you bother, collect all the evidence and prepare well, you still run the risk of becoming a victim of scammers.

Why is this happening?

When registering for Avito.Delivery, the buyer pays for the purchase immediately, but the service keeps the money until the buyer confirms that the goods have arrived and everything is in order. However, the goods are delivered by Russian Post or Boxberry, where employees do not care what the buyer does with the parcel during the inspection period.

How could this be resolved?

Either agree with Russian Post and Boxberry that their employees specifically monitor customers during checks and include this work in the service commission upon delivery, or organize your own pick-up points, where Avito employees will check that there are no substitutions .

The third option is to transfer money to the buyer only after the seller confirms that everything is in order with the package (although this option may provoke new types of fraud).

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