The Finnish police’s national network-assisted crimes investigation unit participated in the investigative cooperation coordinated by Europol, where the police uncovered an international series of online frauds.
The criminals had approached the victims on the social media marketplace by pretending to be buyers through fake profiles and tricked the interested parties into giving their card details to the scam website.
Online scams have become more common. Photo: Unsplash.com
International cooperation
In this case, the international cooperation of the Finnish police began at the initiative of the Ukrainian police.
The interested parties are from different countries: Finland, Denmark, Norway and Hungary. There are about forty Finnish stakeholders.
There are nine suspects and they are citizens of Ukraine. The profit from crime in crimes committed against Finns alone is more than 60,000 euros.
Criminals created fake profiles
Criminals created fake profiles on social media, through which they offered themselves as buyers to interested parties who sold products on the Facebook Marketplace.
After the contact, the criminals sent the interested parties a fishing link made with a bot in the name of Matkahuolto in order to redeem the delivery costs or payment for the product.
The interested parties mistakenly entered their bank card information on the page that opened behind the link.
Criminals thus gained access to card information and transferred funds for their own purposes.
The Finnish police’s national network-assisted crimes investigation unit has mapped the crimes committed in this way in Finland and reported to the police, as well as the potential parties involved.
In December 2024, the national cyber unit of the Ukrainian police carried out several home searches of the suspects’ apartments and seized IT equipment and mobile phones, the investigation of which has revealed evidence of fraud, e.g. fishing message in Finnish in the name of the transport company.
The preliminary investigation is ongoing and the information will probably be updated as the investigation progresses. The police will inform about the matter later as necessary.
Source: Police
Source: hymy.fi
