“Whatever you do, crooks appear everywhere,” the head of state reacted, comparing the scheme with the use of “dead souls”
The Investigative Committee is investigating a criminal case on the embezzlement of budgetary funds from the Pushkin Card. According to investigators, the three defendants, residents of the Moscow region, stole more than 200 million rubles – they used fictitious electronic cards, deceiving employees of the bank and the Ministry of Culture.
Earlier it was reported that Rosfinmonitoring, together with the FSB, found a criminal group that embezzled 100 million by compiling imaginary lists of participants in the Pushkin Card project. This was told to Vladimir Putin by the head of Rosfinmonitoring Yuri Chikhanchin. According to him, there was a similar scheme with tourist cashback. “No matter what you do, crooks appear everywhere,” the president responded.
100 million, taking into account the fact that each “Pushkin card” contains 5,000, is 200,000 dummy people on whom imaginary cards were issued. The “Pushkin card”, which allows you to go to the cinema, theaters, concerts and exhibitions, can be issued by any Russian aged 14 to 22 inclusive. You download the Public Services Culture application, enter your passport data, start a virtual card of Post Bank, and 5,000 rubles are credited there for a year. At the end of December, the rest of the money burns out, in January the money is credited again. The students I interviewed say that, as a rule, they do not check tickets bought with the Pushkin Card and passport data. And scammers really do not sleep, says student Christina:
“I bought tickets before the New Year. I still had funds on the Pushkin card. My friends and I were sitting at the food court and we were approached by two young people who asked if we would like to cash out the remaining money on our Pushkin Card accounts. They offered us to issue a ticket for a volunteer event, give them a small percentage of it, and, accordingly, they return part of the money that will go to the volunteer event. We, of course, did not agree to this. But they went all over the food court. Visually, they offered a similar service to all people up to about 23 years old. And I even saw that someone agreed.
There are also many thematic channels in Telegram, where they offer to cash out the balance from Pushkin Cards. They say that they will take a commission of 500 rubles, the rest is at stake for a person. Another scheme: they offer to buy tickets from your “Pushkin card” for further resale, they promise a good percentage.
But, since you can get only 5 thousand per person, chasing each one is long and expensive. It is easier for scammers to buy databases with passport data of schoolchildren and students – all and those who have already issued Pushkin Cards, suggests Vladimir Shevchenko, editor-in-chief of the Finnews.ru banking portal:
“If someone has not issued within two or three months, most likely, he will not issue further, then he can be used as a “dead soul”. (Scammer) issued a card, you need to buy a ticket for it, and then turn it in and get money in cash. This scheme has an economic benefit when done in bulk. If you try to sell tickets, you can end up with an unsold ticket. It is necessary, by agreement, to work with people who sell tickets so that they can be pushed back, with people who issue Pushkin cards.
Cash – because the tax office sees all transactions. Something similar could be done with tourist cashback. But even here some persons affiliated with hotels are probably involved, says Dmitry Arutyunov, founder and CEO of the Art Tour tour operator:
“I haven’t come across this myself, but, as far as I understand, some accommodation facilities colluded, so to speak, with clients. They booked something there, then received a cashback and canceled the reservation with a subsequent refund to the client.
– And the money, it turns out, was apparently returned in cash?
– I think yes. I cannot prove it, because this is probably the task of the authorized bodies.
Earlier, Deputy Alexander Khinshtein wrote about the fraud with the Pushkin Card and the initiation of criminal cases on this fact in the Samara region. According to him, the criminals organized the “Theater of the New Time”, passed verification and became a participant in the Pushkin Map project. They offered students to “cash out” their cards by giving them the password and receiving some of the money in return. The scammers then sold the tickets to themselves. According to the papers, all the performances were sold out, although in reality the halls were empty. The attackers were detained in December, the damage from their actions was estimated at 15 million rubles.
