Cloned Boy
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When you're 15 and offered 50,000 rubles a week, it's hard to resist. But no one warns you that there are real tragedies behind the numbers on the screen.
This story is a frank confession of a teenager who became part of the largest telephone fraud scheme in Russia. He started with an innocent SMS mailing, and a few months later he was swindling pensioners out of all their savings, posing as a bank employee. The result: 847 deceived victims and millions of stolen rubles.
In this thread:
100 billion rubles. That's how much phone scammers stole during the period when I was part of it. I was 15. All I did was send text messages from a fake phone. 30 thousand a week. That's several times more than my teachers earned. You would agree to that, too. I thought I'd found the perfect part-time job. Until I realized what I'd gotten myself into. I live in a regional center.
The population is about 400 thousand. An ordinary family. Dad works in a management company, mom is an accountant in a clinic. Middle class. Nothing special. A three-room apartment in a residential area, an old foreign car, a vacation at the sea once a year. Everything changed on April 14, 2024. That day, I was sitting at home, scrolling through Telegram. I was preparing for a test in algebra, but I was mostly stuck on my phone.
I saw a post in one of the channels about earnings. An operator is needed to send SMS. Remotely. Salary. Up to 200 thousand a month. No experience needed. 200 thousand a month. My parents didn’t earn that much together. I wrote to the bot specified in the post. The response was quick. Started with simple questions. Age, city, willingness to work at night.
Then I explained the gist. You send SMS through a special panel. Banks, delivery, technical support, regular notifications. We pay for the number of successful sendings. It sounded harmless. Like sending out ads or notifications. I had already worked part-time as an operator at Yandex.Food, I knew what remote work and individual payment was. When can you start, the senior asked.
That’s what I called it in my head. “Even now?” I answered. Half an hour later, a link to the web panel and instructions arrived in the mail. Login, password, simple interface. You choose a message template, upload a database of numbers, click “Send”. Nothing complicated. The first messages really did look like bank notifications. “Your card is blocked. Follow the link to unblock. Or the parcel is awaiting receipt.
Pay the commission." They paid fairly. 50 rubles for 100 sent SMS. If people clicked on the link, they got a bonus. On the first day, I earned 800 rubles for 3 hours of work. That was crazy money for a schoolboy. My parents thought I was learning English through an app. I sat in the room with headphones, poking at my phone. What was suspicious about that? And I explained the money by saying that I was writing a test and helping high school students with computer science, so as not to get caught.
I worked every day after school. The phone number database was updated automatically. Thousands of phones all over Russia. I just pressed buttons and watched the numbers in my wallet grow. I earned 12 thousand in the first week. 47 in a month. In May, my senior suggested increasing the workload. He gave me access to "hotter" databases. The numbers of people who had already responded to such messages paid more.
80 rubles per hundred square meters, plus a percentage of clicks. I didn’t ask questions. I only saw numbers. Sent, delivered, earned. It was a game. I was good at this game. By the end of May, I was earning about 25 thousand a week. More than my classmates earned all summer working part-time. I bought myself everything I wanted. New sneakers, AirPods, games on Steam. I told my parents that I had saved up. My senior praised my productivity.
He said that I was one of the best on the team, offered bonuses for overtime, bonuses for the quality of work. I felt like a valuable employee of a successful company. Everything seemed legal. The gray area of Internet marketing. I sent out SMS, received money. A simple scheme, no catches. Until I received that message from my senior that changed everything. Ready to move to the next level? Less work, more money. But I would need voice messages.
I didn’t understand what voice messages meant. But the number in the next message overcame all doubts. “Up to 50 thousand a week” – interested. “50 thousand a week” – in a month “more than both parents earned together” – interested, I wrote. But then I didn’t know what I was signing up for, and I didn’t yet understand that “voice calls would change everything” and that there would be no turning back.
On June 26, 2024, the elder sent new instructions. “Now my task has become more complicated. Instead of sending out mass SMS, I had to call specific people, those who had already bitten the bullet and clicked on the link. Introduce yourself as a bank employee,” the elder explained. “Say that their card is at risk. We urgently need to confirm the data for protection.”
A calling program was attached to the message. The interface is simple. You load the number database. You choose what name to call on – Sberbank, VTB, Tinkoff – and press “call”. The program itself replaced the number from which the call is made. The official bank number was displayed on the victim’s screen. The first call was made on June 27 at about 7 pm. My hands were shaking. A man answered in a rough voice.
“Good evening. This is Sberbank’s security service. Your card has fallen into the risk zone.” “Go to hell, scammer!” And short beeps. The second call. A middle-aged woman, but the result was the same. “I know your schemes. And hang up.” And so, on my seventh call, I successfully processed the first victim. A woman of about forty answered, judging by her voice. “Good evening. This is Sberbank’s security service. Your card has fallen into the risk zone.
Suspicious transactions have been recorded.” “What transactions?” she asked anxiously. Then I read from the script given by the senior officer. I talked about scammers trying to gain access to her card. That she urgently needed to block the old card and get a new one. “Are you sure you’re from the bank?” she asked cautiously. There are a lot of scammers calling now. “Of course, madam. Look at the phone screen. Do you see the number?
You can check it right now on the Internet, it is the official number of Sberbank. She checked. The number was indeed official. The program substituted it perfectly. For additional verification, tell me the last four digits of your card. I continued. I will check it with our database. She gave it to me. I paused, as if checking. Everything is correct. Now I need full details for emergency blocking.
Fifteen minutes of persuasion, and she dictated the card number, expiration date and CVV code. For this successful call, I received 5 thousand rubles. For about half an hour of work. “Good work,” the senior wrote, “Tomorrow I will give the hot database. People there are already scared, they take it easier.” The hot database was the numbers of those who had received SMS messages in the last few days about blocked cards or problems with accounts. They were already in a state of alarm, waiting for a call from the bank. For
the next two weeks, I called every day after school, sat down at the computer, launched the program and started calling the list. On average, 15-20 calls per evening. 4-5 were successful. For each “knocked out” card data, they paid from 3 thousand to 5 thousand rubles, depending on the amount in the account. By mid-July, my weekly revenue had grown to 40 thousand. I bought what I wanted, without counting money. A new iPhone 15. Branded clothes. Top-end headphones.
I told my parents that I was very successful in trading in games, buying skins cheaply and selling them more expensively. But most importantly, I felt like a professional. The eldest regularly sent updates, new conversation scenarios, fresh databases, improved programs for spoofing. I studied human psychology, learned to evoke the necessary emotions, fear, urgency, trust. The main thing is to create a sense of disaster, the eldest taught.
People in a panic do not think logically. They just want the problem to disappear. And it worked. Flawlessly. At the end of July, the eldest suggested another improvement. Now I did not just receive card data, but immediately helped people, so to speak, protect their money. “Transfer all funds to a safe account,” I told the victims. "This is a temporary measure. As soon as we block the scammers, we will return the money back."
The safe account, of course, belonged to our team. August 3, 2024, was my most successful day. In one evening, I processed 18 people. 11 gave their card details, 6 agreed to transfer money to a safe account. My share is 84 thousand. 84 thousand rubles for 4 hours of work. I felt like the king of the world.
I bought gifts for friends, took girls to expensive restaurants, rented an apartment for a day for parties. At 15, I had the life of a successful adult. The elder praised my results. Said that he was considering my candidacy for a promotion. Coordinators of newcomers. Promised a percentage of their earnings plus bonuses for training. I went with the flow of success and money. I did not think about what happens to people after our calls. They were just voices in the receiver, sources of numbers on the screen.
Until September 15, 2024, I made the call that changed everything. I still dream about that voice at night. September 15, 2024. Monday. I remember that day down to the smallest detail. By that time, I was already working at a percentage rate, as a valuable employee. I came home from school around 4 p.m., ate, sat down at the computer.
The usual routine. The boss sent me a new database. A particularly hot one, as he put it. People who had already received several SMS messages about their cards being blocked and were on the verge of panic. The first five calls went as usual. Three hung up immediately, two listened but refused to give out their data. A woman answered on the sixth number. Her voice was quiet, elderly. "Hello?" "Good afternoon, this is Sberbank's security service, your card has fallen into the risk zone.
Oh, my God, she's worried again. I've been receiving messages about the card for three days now, I'm so worried. The perfect victim. Already scared, ready for a dialogue. Don’t worry, we’ll help. We’ll block the scammers’ card now and protect your funds. Tell me, how much is in your account? Oh, I don’t know exactly, my pension was recently transferred, plus I’ve saved 1,180, probably. 180 thousand rubles. For a pensioner, that’s a fortune.
I’ve been saving for years. Good. That’s a large sum. We need to protect it urgently. The scammers are already close to your account. Now I’ll help you transfer your money to a safe deposit. Then the standard scenario followed. I dictated our safe account number to her, explained how to make a transfer via a mobile app. She wasn’t very tech-savvy, and asked several times. “Are you sure you’re from the bank?” She suddenly began to doubt it.
My granddaughter used to say that there are a lot of scammers. “Grandma, look at the phone screen. What number is showing up?” She slowly dictated the number. “That’s right, this is the official Sberbank hotline number. Fraudsters can’t call from a number like that. Now tell me, “What’s your last name?” “Morozova.” “Elena Vasilievna Morozova? The card ending in 4726?”
“Yes, yes, that’s right,” she was surprised. Of course, I had this data from the database, but for her it was the final proof. The transfer procedure took half an hour. She slowly followed my instructions. She made mistakes several times, and I patiently corrected them. Finally, the transfer was completed. “That’s it, your money is safe,” I said. In a week, when we catch the fraudsters, we’ll transfer it back. Thank you very much, young man. You saved me. I was so worried, I couldn’t sleep at night.
These one hundred and eighty thousand. This is all I have. Besides my pension. There was such sincere gratitude in her voice that something inside me sank. No way. I mumbled and quickly hung up. The senior one immediately wrote. Excellent work. 180 thousand net. Your share is 54 thousand. 54 thousand rubles for a half-hour conversation with a pensioner.
But instead of joy, I felt something strange. For the first time in a month and work, I thought. What happens to people after our calls? In the evening, I went online and started reading news about telephone scammers, stories of victims, pensioners who lost their life savings, people who took out loans, families that were destroyed by financial losses.
One article especially caught my attention. A seventy-three-year-old resident of Voronezh lost one hundred and eighty-five thousand rubles after a call from a bank employee. She was saving money for the treatment of her disabled husband. After losing all her savings, she had a heart attack. 185 thousand. Almost like my victim today. I imagined that granny from the call. How she would go to the bank in a week to find out about her money.
How they would explain to her that she had become a victim of scammers. That there was no more money. That the so-called safe deposit was a scam. How she would cry. That night I couldn’t sleep. For the first time in months of work, I understood. I am not an IT employee, I am not a security specialist. I am a fraudster, a criminal. I steal money from old people. The next day, the senior sent a new database.
I looked at the list of numbers and could not bring myself to dial the first one. "What happened?" he wrote in the evening. "Worked great yesterday, not a single call today." "I feel bad," I lied. Pull yourself together tomorrow. There are hot clients, I need to work them off. But I couldn't. Every time I picked up the phone, I remembered the voice of that granny. Her gratitude. Her naive trust. A week later, the senior started putting pressure on me. What's going on? It's been a week of downtime. The other guys are showing results, and you're sitting there.
Are you tired? Need a break. A break? With that kind of money. Are you crazy? Work. Or I'll find a replacement. The threat of replacement did not scare me. On the contrary, I began to hope that they would simply exclude me from the team and I would be able to forget about this nightmare. But the senior did not give up. He offered bonuses, promised promotions, pressed on greed. And when that didn’t work, he started threatening.
We have recordings of all your calls. Your voice, your data. If you want to leave the hard way, there will be problems. On October 2, 2024, I made a decision. I wrote to my senior. I’m leaving. Delete my contacts. Think again, he replied. You won’t earn that kind of money anywhere else. I’ve already decided. I said it confidently. That same evening, I deleted the calling program, cleared the history, and deleted Telegram.
I took out all the money I’d earned from my account card, about 500 thousand rubles. And hid it at home in cash. I told my parents that the project was closed and I wouldn’t work part-time anymore. I returned to my normal school life. Lessons, homework, meetings with friends. But there was no peace. Every night I dreamed of that pensioner’s voice. Her words. “Thank you very much, young man.
You saved me." I tried to forget, but it didn't work. The news constantly flashed stories about telephone scammers. Each time I shuddered, thinking. What if they show one of my victims? The months dragged on slowly. I gradually calmed down, thinking that it was all behind me, that the digital traces were erased, that no one would find me. The elder one no longer wrote, the programs were deleted, the contacts were erased. I was clean. Or so I thought. I left the scheme and forgot about it.
But it did not forget about me. Six months of freedom. That's what I called the period from October 2024 to March 2025. The first weeks after leaving the scheme were hard. I constantly looked back, expecting a catch. Every call from an unfamiliar number made my heart beat faster. What if it was the elder one? What if the threats were serious? But the weeks went by, and nothing happened.
In November, I began to spend the money I had saved. Carefully, in small amounts. A new laptop, clothes, gifts for friends' birthdays. I explained to my parents that I had invested well in cryptocurrency and its growth. By December, the fears had almost disappeared. I lived the ordinary life of a 15-year-old schoolboy. Study, friends, computer games.
Winter holidays passed calmly. New Year, skating rink, parties. I almost forgot about the nightmare that I created in the summer. It seemed like a different life, a different person. In January 2025, ordinary school days began. Preparation for the Unified State Exam, additional classes, plans to enter a technical school. I even thought about connecting my life with IT, but honestly, working as a programmer or system administrator. On February 14, Valentine's Day, I met a girl from a parallel class.
Nastya. We started dating, went to the movies, walked around the city. Ordinary teenage relationships without a dark past. In March, a new dream appeared - to go to a language camp in Bulgaria in the summer. It cost 80 thousand rubles. But I had money. My parents were surprised by my desire to study English abroad, but they did not object.
I felt like an ordinary schoolboy with a clear conscience. And I almost forgot about this grandmother, on March 25, 2025, while browsing the news in Telegram, I came across a note. The organizer of a large fraudulent scheme was detained in Moscow. The damage amounted to more than 100 million rubles. My heart skipped a beat. I read on. The detainee coordinated the work of several dozen performers.
The scheme operated from February to December 2024. From February to December, two thousand and twenty-four. That is the period when I worked. According to the investigation, the main category of persons are citizens under thirty years of age, often minors. My hands began to shake. I reread the news three times, hoping that I was wrong.
But no. That was our plan. Our eldest was caught. The following days I lived in constant fear. Every rustle in the entryway, every unfamiliar number on my parents' phone made me think. That's it, they've come for me. But day after day passed, and nothing happened. On March 30th, I couldn't stand it. I started googling the news. I found an article. A photo of a detainee. A guy, about twenty-five years old.
In a jacket, looking at the floor. Could this really be the same eldest with whom I'd been corresponding for six months? The article mentioned that the investigation had seized the servers with databases of correspondence and call records. Work was underway to identify all the members of the criminal group. I understood that they would find my calls, my messages, my voice in the recordings. It was only a matter of time. But time passed, and nothing happened.
On April 1st, I even thought that it was some kind of mystical date, April Fool's Day. And everything would work out. That they had caught the wrong person, or the recordings were damaged, or the investigation would not get to the minor perpetrators. On April 2, I went to bed thinking that tomorrow would be a normal school day. I was wrong. April 3, 2025, at 6 a.m. A sharp doorbell broke the morning silence. I was awakened by voices in the hallway.
Unfamiliar male voices, my parents answering in worried voices. “Is your son home?” I heard. “Yes, he’s sleeping. What happened?” The Investigative Committee. “We have a search warrant.” My heart sank. I knew this moment would come someday, but when it came, I was unprepared. Three men in civilian clothes entered the room. Politely but insistently asked me to get dressed and come with them.
“Mom, what’s going on?” I asked, feigning surprise. “Son, these people are saying that you… that you were involved in some kind of fraud on the Internet.” Mom was crying. Dad stood there pale, not understanding what was happening. "There is reason to believe that you are involved in the activities of an organized crime group," one of the operatives explained. "You need to go and give evidence."
I did not resist. Deep down, I knew that sooner or later this would happen. I was silent in the car, thinking about the situation. They found recordings of my calls, restored correspondence, traced financial flows. Now I had a choice - to cooperate or not. But who to cooperate with? I did not know the real names, addresses, nothing except for the nickname in the telegram of the work scheme. At that time, I did not yet know that the case contained details that would change my attitude to everything that was happening.
At the Investigative Committee, they showed me a folder, a thick one, with hundreds of sheets. A case of fraud on an especially large scale. The investigator, a man of about . He spoke calmly. "We have recordings of all your calls. Your voice has been identified by an expert. The correspondence has been restored. You can cooperate, you will get a suspended sentence. If you remain silent, you will get a real one."
But it wasn’t the threats that broke me. It was the photographs. The investigator opened the folder and showed the pictures. Elena Vasilyevna Morozova, 73. That same grandmother. In the photo, she was lying in a hospital ward, hooked up to an IV. “A heart attack,” the investigator said. “After I realized I had no more money, I saved up for my grandson’s operation for cerebral palsy.
I looked at the photo and understood. I didn’t just steal money, I stole hope.” There were other pictures in the folder, dozens of people our team had deceived. Pensioners, large families, the disabled. Each with a story, with dreams, with plans for the stolen money. “Do you want to see the statistics?” the investigator asked. “847 victims from your calls. Total damage – 12.3 million rubles.”
“847 people” – 12.3 million. Numbers that represented ruined lives. I testified, told everything I knew about the scheme. But the elder one turned out to be smarter, no one knew his real name. His address, too. Only his nickname and burnt-out phone numbers. My parents didn't turn away, my mother cried, but hugged me, my father was silent, but hired a lawyer. They loved me, no matter what, and that was the only bright spot in this nightmare.
Now I'm on bail, not on leave. The case is in court. The lawyer says, most likely, a suspended sentence, given my age and cooperation with the investigation. But the court's verdict is not the main thing. The main thing is that I realized who I became. At 15, I ruined the lives of 847 people, according to the investigation. And no remorse will fix that. That's why I'm writing this confession. Maybe some teenager will read it and think twice before agreeing to a harmless part-time job.
Or maybe an investigator or prosecutor will find this text and understand? Before me is not a member of an organized crime group, but a kid who didn't know what he was getting into. I crossed the line between stupidity and crime the moment I dialed the pensioner's number for the first time. I only realized it when it was too late. I'm 16, I'm a fraud, and I'll have to live with it for the rest of my life.
This story has collected over 1,200 comments on the forum where it was first published. Several users wrote that they recognized their relatives in the description who had become victims of similar calls. One commenter said that his grandmother had also saved money for her grandson's treatment and lost everything after a similar conversation. The Internet is full of offers of "easy money" for minors. And you can only check the real value of this money when it's too late.
According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the average age of perpetrators in telephone schemes is 16 to 20 years old. They do not understand that they are becoming part of a crime that is ruining the lives of hundreds of people. If this story made you think, share it with those who may find themselves in a similar situation. Perhaps someone's future can still be changed.
(c) Mr. Dark Web
This story is a frank confession of a teenager who became part of the largest telephone fraud scheme in Russia. He started with an innocent SMS mailing, and a few months later he was swindling pensioners out of all their savings, posing as a bank employee. The result: 847 deceived victims and millions of stolen rubles.
In this thread:
- How a schoolboy was recruited via Telegram
- How does the number spoofing phone call scheme work?
- Why Teens Are Easily Involved in Criminal Schemes
- The story of one call that changed everything
- Aftermath: Trial, Repentance, and Life After Crime
100 billion rubles. That's how much phone scammers stole during the period when I was part of it. I was 15. All I did was send text messages from a fake phone. 30 thousand a week. That's several times more than my teachers earned. You would agree to that, too. I thought I'd found the perfect part-time job. Until I realized what I'd gotten myself into. I live in a regional center.
The population is about 400 thousand. An ordinary family. Dad works in a management company, mom is an accountant in a clinic. Middle class. Nothing special. A three-room apartment in a residential area, an old foreign car, a vacation at the sea once a year. Everything changed on April 14, 2024. That day, I was sitting at home, scrolling through Telegram. I was preparing for a test in algebra, but I was mostly stuck on my phone.
I saw a post in one of the channels about earnings. An operator is needed to send SMS. Remotely. Salary. Up to 200 thousand a month. No experience needed. 200 thousand a month. My parents didn’t earn that much together. I wrote to the bot specified in the post. The response was quick. Started with simple questions. Age, city, willingness to work at night.
Then I explained the gist. You send SMS through a special panel. Banks, delivery, technical support, regular notifications. We pay for the number of successful sendings. It sounded harmless. Like sending out ads or notifications. I had already worked part-time as an operator at Yandex.Food, I knew what remote work and individual payment was. When can you start, the senior asked.
That’s what I called it in my head. “Even now?” I answered. Half an hour later, a link to the web panel and instructions arrived in the mail. Login, password, simple interface. You choose a message template, upload a database of numbers, click “Send”. Nothing complicated. The first messages really did look like bank notifications. “Your card is blocked. Follow the link to unblock. Or the parcel is awaiting receipt.
Pay the commission." They paid fairly. 50 rubles for 100 sent SMS. If people clicked on the link, they got a bonus. On the first day, I earned 800 rubles for 3 hours of work. That was crazy money for a schoolboy. My parents thought I was learning English through an app. I sat in the room with headphones, poking at my phone. What was suspicious about that? And I explained the money by saying that I was writing a test and helping high school students with computer science, so as not to get caught.
I worked every day after school. The phone number database was updated automatically. Thousands of phones all over Russia. I just pressed buttons and watched the numbers in my wallet grow. I earned 12 thousand in the first week. 47 in a month. In May, my senior suggested increasing the workload. He gave me access to "hotter" databases. The numbers of people who had already responded to such messages paid more.
80 rubles per hundred square meters, plus a percentage of clicks. I didn’t ask questions. I only saw numbers. Sent, delivered, earned. It was a game. I was good at this game. By the end of May, I was earning about 25 thousand a week. More than my classmates earned all summer working part-time. I bought myself everything I wanted. New sneakers, AirPods, games on Steam. I told my parents that I had saved up. My senior praised my productivity.
He said that I was one of the best on the team, offered bonuses for overtime, bonuses for the quality of work. I felt like a valuable employee of a successful company. Everything seemed legal. The gray area of Internet marketing. I sent out SMS, received money. A simple scheme, no catches. Until I received that message from my senior that changed everything. Ready to move to the next level? Less work, more money. But I would need voice messages.
I didn’t understand what voice messages meant. But the number in the next message overcame all doubts. “Up to 50 thousand a week” – interested. “50 thousand a week” – in a month “more than both parents earned together” – interested, I wrote. But then I didn’t know what I was signing up for, and I didn’t yet understand that “voice calls would change everything” and that there would be no turning back.
On June 26, 2024, the elder sent new instructions. “Now my task has become more complicated. Instead of sending out mass SMS, I had to call specific people, those who had already bitten the bullet and clicked on the link. Introduce yourself as a bank employee,” the elder explained. “Say that their card is at risk. We urgently need to confirm the data for protection.”
A calling program was attached to the message. The interface is simple. You load the number database. You choose what name to call on – Sberbank, VTB, Tinkoff – and press “call”. The program itself replaced the number from which the call is made. The official bank number was displayed on the victim’s screen. The first call was made on June 27 at about 7 pm. My hands were shaking. A man answered in a rough voice.
“Good evening. This is Sberbank’s security service. Your card has fallen into the risk zone.” “Go to hell, scammer!” And short beeps. The second call. A middle-aged woman, but the result was the same. “I know your schemes. And hang up.” And so, on my seventh call, I successfully processed the first victim. A woman of about forty answered, judging by her voice. “Good evening. This is Sberbank’s security service. Your card has fallen into the risk zone.
Suspicious transactions have been recorded.” “What transactions?” she asked anxiously. Then I read from the script given by the senior officer. I talked about scammers trying to gain access to her card. That she urgently needed to block the old card and get a new one. “Are you sure you’re from the bank?” she asked cautiously. There are a lot of scammers calling now. “Of course, madam. Look at the phone screen. Do you see the number?
You can check it right now on the Internet, it is the official number of Sberbank. She checked. The number was indeed official. The program substituted it perfectly. For additional verification, tell me the last four digits of your card. I continued. I will check it with our database. She gave it to me. I paused, as if checking. Everything is correct. Now I need full details for emergency blocking.
Fifteen minutes of persuasion, and she dictated the card number, expiration date and CVV code. For this successful call, I received 5 thousand rubles. For about half an hour of work. “Good work,” the senior wrote, “Tomorrow I will give the hot database. People there are already scared, they take it easier.” The hot database was the numbers of those who had received SMS messages in the last few days about blocked cards or problems with accounts. They were already in a state of alarm, waiting for a call from the bank. For
the next two weeks, I called every day after school, sat down at the computer, launched the program and started calling the list. On average, 15-20 calls per evening. 4-5 were successful. For each “knocked out” card data, they paid from 3 thousand to 5 thousand rubles, depending on the amount in the account. By mid-July, my weekly revenue had grown to 40 thousand. I bought what I wanted, without counting money. A new iPhone 15. Branded clothes. Top-end headphones.
I told my parents that I was very successful in trading in games, buying skins cheaply and selling them more expensively. But most importantly, I felt like a professional. The eldest regularly sent updates, new conversation scenarios, fresh databases, improved programs for spoofing. I studied human psychology, learned to evoke the necessary emotions, fear, urgency, trust. The main thing is to create a sense of disaster, the eldest taught.
People in a panic do not think logically. They just want the problem to disappear. And it worked. Flawlessly. At the end of July, the eldest suggested another improvement. Now I did not just receive card data, but immediately helped people, so to speak, protect their money. “Transfer all funds to a safe account,” I told the victims. "This is a temporary measure. As soon as we block the scammers, we will return the money back."
The safe account, of course, belonged to our team. August 3, 2024, was my most successful day. In one evening, I processed 18 people. 11 gave their card details, 6 agreed to transfer money to a safe account. My share is 84 thousand. 84 thousand rubles for 4 hours of work. I felt like the king of the world.
I bought gifts for friends, took girls to expensive restaurants, rented an apartment for a day for parties. At 15, I had the life of a successful adult. The elder praised my results. Said that he was considering my candidacy for a promotion. Coordinators of newcomers. Promised a percentage of their earnings plus bonuses for training. I went with the flow of success and money. I did not think about what happens to people after our calls. They were just voices in the receiver, sources of numbers on the screen.
Until September 15, 2024, I made the call that changed everything. I still dream about that voice at night. September 15, 2024. Monday. I remember that day down to the smallest detail. By that time, I was already working at a percentage rate, as a valuable employee. I came home from school around 4 p.m., ate, sat down at the computer.
The usual routine. The boss sent me a new database. A particularly hot one, as he put it. People who had already received several SMS messages about their cards being blocked and were on the verge of panic. The first five calls went as usual. Three hung up immediately, two listened but refused to give out their data. A woman answered on the sixth number. Her voice was quiet, elderly. "Hello?" "Good afternoon, this is Sberbank's security service, your card has fallen into the risk zone.
Oh, my God, she's worried again. I've been receiving messages about the card for three days now, I'm so worried. The perfect victim. Already scared, ready for a dialogue. Don’t worry, we’ll help. We’ll block the scammers’ card now and protect your funds. Tell me, how much is in your account? Oh, I don’t know exactly, my pension was recently transferred, plus I’ve saved 1,180, probably. 180 thousand rubles. For a pensioner, that’s a fortune.
I’ve been saving for years. Good. That’s a large sum. We need to protect it urgently. The scammers are already close to your account. Now I’ll help you transfer your money to a safe deposit. Then the standard scenario followed. I dictated our safe account number to her, explained how to make a transfer via a mobile app. She wasn’t very tech-savvy, and asked several times. “Are you sure you’re from the bank?” She suddenly began to doubt it.
My granddaughter used to say that there are a lot of scammers. “Grandma, look at the phone screen. What number is showing up?” She slowly dictated the number. “That’s right, this is the official Sberbank hotline number. Fraudsters can’t call from a number like that. Now tell me, “What’s your last name?” “Morozova.” “Elena Vasilievna Morozova? The card ending in 4726?”
“Yes, yes, that’s right,” she was surprised. Of course, I had this data from the database, but for her it was the final proof. The transfer procedure took half an hour. She slowly followed my instructions. She made mistakes several times, and I patiently corrected them. Finally, the transfer was completed. “That’s it, your money is safe,” I said. In a week, when we catch the fraudsters, we’ll transfer it back. Thank you very much, young man. You saved me. I was so worried, I couldn’t sleep at night.
These one hundred and eighty thousand. This is all I have. Besides my pension. There was such sincere gratitude in her voice that something inside me sank. No way. I mumbled and quickly hung up. The senior one immediately wrote. Excellent work. 180 thousand net. Your share is 54 thousand. 54 thousand rubles for a half-hour conversation with a pensioner.
But instead of joy, I felt something strange. For the first time in a month and work, I thought. What happens to people after our calls? In the evening, I went online and started reading news about telephone scammers, stories of victims, pensioners who lost their life savings, people who took out loans, families that were destroyed by financial losses.
One article especially caught my attention. A seventy-three-year-old resident of Voronezh lost one hundred and eighty-five thousand rubles after a call from a bank employee. She was saving money for the treatment of her disabled husband. After losing all her savings, she had a heart attack. 185 thousand. Almost like my victim today. I imagined that granny from the call. How she would go to the bank in a week to find out about her money.
How they would explain to her that she had become a victim of scammers. That there was no more money. That the so-called safe deposit was a scam. How she would cry. That night I couldn’t sleep. For the first time in months of work, I understood. I am not an IT employee, I am not a security specialist. I am a fraudster, a criminal. I steal money from old people. The next day, the senior sent a new database.
I looked at the list of numbers and could not bring myself to dial the first one. "What happened?" he wrote in the evening. "Worked great yesterday, not a single call today." "I feel bad," I lied. Pull yourself together tomorrow. There are hot clients, I need to work them off. But I couldn't. Every time I picked up the phone, I remembered the voice of that granny. Her gratitude. Her naive trust. A week later, the senior started putting pressure on me. What's going on? It's been a week of downtime. The other guys are showing results, and you're sitting there.
Are you tired? Need a break. A break? With that kind of money. Are you crazy? Work. Or I'll find a replacement. The threat of replacement did not scare me. On the contrary, I began to hope that they would simply exclude me from the team and I would be able to forget about this nightmare. But the senior did not give up. He offered bonuses, promised promotions, pressed on greed. And when that didn’t work, he started threatening.
We have recordings of all your calls. Your voice, your data. If you want to leave the hard way, there will be problems. On October 2, 2024, I made a decision. I wrote to my senior. I’m leaving. Delete my contacts. Think again, he replied. You won’t earn that kind of money anywhere else. I’ve already decided. I said it confidently. That same evening, I deleted the calling program, cleared the history, and deleted Telegram.
I took out all the money I’d earned from my account card, about 500 thousand rubles. And hid it at home in cash. I told my parents that the project was closed and I wouldn’t work part-time anymore. I returned to my normal school life. Lessons, homework, meetings with friends. But there was no peace. Every night I dreamed of that pensioner’s voice. Her words. “Thank you very much, young man.
You saved me." I tried to forget, but it didn't work. The news constantly flashed stories about telephone scammers. Each time I shuddered, thinking. What if they show one of my victims? The months dragged on slowly. I gradually calmed down, thinking that it was all behind me, that the digital traces were erased, that no one would find me. The elder one no longer wrote, the programs were deleted, the contacts were erased. I was clean. Or so I thought. I left the scheme and forgot about it.
But it did not forget about me. Six months of freedom. That's what I called the period from October 2024 to March 2025. The first weeks after leaving the scheme were hard. I constantly looked back, expecting a catch. Every call from an unfamiliar number made my heart beat faster. What if it was the elder one? What if the threats were serious? But the weeks went by, and nothing happened.
In November, I began to spend the money I had saved. Carefully, in small amounts. A new laptop, clothes, gifts for friends' birthdays. I explained to my parents that I had invested well in cryptocurrency and its growth. By December, the fears had almost disappeared. I lived the ordinary life of a 15-year-old schoolboy. Study, friends, computer games.
Winter holidays passed calmly. New Year, skating rink, parties. I almost forgot about the nightmare that I created in the summer. It seemed like a different life, a different person. In January 2025, ordinary school days began. Preparation for the Unified State Exam, additional classes, plans to enter a technical school. I even thought about connecting my life with IT, but honestly, working as a programmer or system administrator. On February 14, Valentine's Day, I met a girl from a parallel class.
Nastya. We started dating, went to the movies, walked around the city. Ordinary teenage relationships without a dark past. In March, a new dream appeared - to go to a language camp in Bulgaria in the summer. It cost 80 thousand rubles. But I had money. My parents were surprised by my desire to study English abroad, but they did not object.
I felt like an ordinary schoolboy with a clear conscience. And I almost forgot about this grandmother, on March 25, 2025, while browsing the news in Telegram, I came across a note. The organizer of a large fraudulent scheme was detained in Moscow. The damage amounted to more than 100 million rubles. My heart skipped a beat. I read on. The detainee coordinated the work of several dozen performers.
The scheme operated from February to December 2024. From February to December, two thousand and twenty-four. That is the period when I worked. According to the investigation, the main category of persons are citizens under thirty years of age, often minors. My hands began to shake. I reread the news three times, hoping that I was wrong.
But no. That was our plan. Our eldest was caught. The following days I lived in constant fear. Every rustle in the entryway, every unfamiliar number on my parents' phone made me think. That's it, they've come for me. But day after day passed, and nothing happened. On March 30th, I couldn't stand it. I started googling the news. I found an article. A photo of a detainee. A guy, about twenty-five years old.
In a jacket, looking at the floor. Could this really be the same eldest with whom I'd been corresponding for six months? The article mentioned that the investigation had seized the servers with databases of correspondence and call records. Work was underway to identify all the members of the criminal group. I understood that they would find my calls, my messages, my voice in the recordings. It was only a matter of time. But time passed, and nothing happened.
On April 1st, I even thought that it was some kind of mystical date, April Fool's Day. And everything would work out. That they had caught the wrong person, or the recordings were damaged, or the investigation would not get to the minor perpetrators. On April 2, I went to bed thinking that tomorrow would be a normal school day. I was wrong. April 3, 2025, at 6 a.m. A sharp doorbell broke the morning silence. I was awakened by voices in the hallway.
Unfamiliar male voices, my parents answering in worried voices. “Is your son home?” I heard. “Yes, he’s sleeping. What happened?” The Investigative Committee. “We have a search warrant.” My heart sank. I knew this moment would come someday, but when it came, I was unprepared. Three men in civilian clothes entered the room. Politely but insistently asked me to get dressed and come with them.
“Mom, what’s going on?” I asked, feigning surprise. “Son, these people are saying that you… that you were involved in some kind of fraud on the Internet.” Mom was crying. Dad stood there pale, not understanding what was happening. "There is reason to believe that you are involved in the activities of an organized crime group," one of the operatives explained. "You need to go and give evidence."
I did not resist. Deep down, I knew that sooner or later this would happen. I was silent in the car, thinking about the situation. They found recordings of my calls, restored correspondence, traced financial flows. Now I had a choice - to cooperate or not. But who to cooperate with? I did not know the real names, addresses, nothing except for the nickname in the telegram of the work scheme. At that time, I did not yet know that the case contained details that would change my attitude to everything that was happening.
At the Investigative Committee, they showed me a folder, a thick one, with hundreds of sheets. A case of fraud on an especially large scale. The investigator, a man of about . He spoke calmly. "We have recordings of all your calls. Your voice has been identified by an expert. The correspondence has been restored. You can cooperate, you will get a suspended sentence. If you remain silent, you will get a real one."
But it wasn’t the threats that broke me. It was the photographs. The investigator opened the folder and showed the pictures. Elena Vasilyevna Morozova, 73. That same grandmother. In the photo, she was lying in a hospital ward, hooked up to an IV. “A heart attack,” the investigator said. “After I realized I had no more money, I saved up for my grandson’s operation for cerebral palsy.
I looked at the photo and understood. I didn’t just steal money, I stole hope.” There were other pictures in the folder, dozens of people our team had deceived. Pensioners, large families, the disabled. Each with a story, with dreams, with plans for the stolen money. “Do you want to see the statistics?” the investigator asked. “847 victims from your calls. Total damage – 12.3 million rubles.”
“847 people” – 12.3 million. Numbers that represented ruined lives. I testified, told everything I knew about the scheme. But the elder one turned out to be smarter, no one knew his real name. His address, too. Only his nickname and burnt-out phone numbers. My parents didn't turn away, my mother cried, but hugged me, my father was silent, but hired a lawyer. They loved me, no matter what, and that was the only bright spot in this nightmare.
Now I'm on bail, not on leave. The case is in court. The lawyer says, most likely, a suspended sentence, given my age and cooperation with the investigation. But the court's verdict is not the main thing. The main thing is that I realized who I became. At 15, I ruined the lives of 847 people, according to the investigation. And no remorse will fix that. That's why I'm writing this confession. Maybe some teenager will read it and think twice before agreeing to a harmless part-time job.
Or maybe an investigator or prosecutor will find this text and understand? Before me is not a member of an organized crime group, but a kid who didn't know what he was getting into. I crossed the line between stupidity and crime the moment I dialed the pensioner's number for the first time. I only realized it when it was too late. I'm 16, I'm a fraud, and I'll have to live with it for the rest of my life.
This story has collected over 1,200 comments on the forum where it was first published. Several users wrote that they recognized their relatives in the description who had become victims of similar calls. One commenter said that his grandmother had also saved money for her grandson's treatment and lost everything after a similar conversation. The Internet is full of offers of "easy money" for minors. And you can only check the real value of this money when it's too late.
According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the average age of perpetrators in telephone schemes is 16 to 20 years old. They do not understand that they are becoming part of a crime that is ruining the lives of hundreds of people. If this story made you think, share it with those who may find themselves in a similar situation. Perhaps someone's future can still be changed.
(c) Mr. Dark Web
