In the Yaroslavl region, members of an interregional criminal community that assisted Ukrainian telephone scammers were arrested. SIM boxes and over 2 thousand SIM cards, with which the attackers used to deceive Russians, were confiscated from the suspects. The FSB believes that the equipment was also used for sabotage and terrorism.
In the Yaroslavl region, employees of the FSB and the Ministry of Internal Affairs stopped the activities of three interregional criminal groups that helped Ukrainian call centers in fraud and extortion of funds from Russians. This was reported by official representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Irina Volk.
The investigation believes that the criminal scheme was based on a contactless method of committing thefts using special equipment that allows you to replace foreign calls with Russian numbers and provide remote call control.
To place the SIM boxes, the accomplices rented apartments in Yaroslavl and Kostroma. The suspects were engaged in servicing SIM boxes, replacing SIM cards, constantly moving devices and providing stable access to the Internet to commit illegal actions. The crimes took place from December 2024 to November 2025. The alleged leader of the criminal community acted as the head of the sim-box operators. In Yaroslavl, during searches at the place of residence of the defendants in the case, four SIM boxes and more than 2 thousand SIM cards, as well as other equipment supporting illegal activities, were discovered and seized.
“The SIM boxes used by the detained persons were an integral part of the infrastructure of Ukrainian fraudulent call centers and were used to organize sabotage and terrorist activities on the territory of the Russian Federation, as well as to carry out other actions aimed at helping the enemy in a special military operation,” the Russian FSB said.
In total, 11 people were involved in the criminal scheme, according to Ms. Volk, including couriers who took money from Russians after communicating with scammers. The damage as a result of the activities of the criminal community exceeded 8 million rubles.
The Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Yaroslavl Region opened three criminal cases regarding the illegal use of a subscriber terminal for traffic transmission or a virtual telephone exchange (Article 274.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), the FSB reported. At the same time, Ms. Volk reported that a case had been opened regarding the organization of a criminal community or participation in it (Article 210 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). The FSB is collecting the necessary evidence to reclassify cases under articles of treason (Article 275 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and a terrorist act (Article 205 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).
“A preventive measure in the form of detention has been chosen against all defendants in the criminal case,” said official representative of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs Irina Volk.
