Two Frenchmen defrauded with "Belarusian rubles": victims were given old Belarusian money in exchange for euros

Two young Frenchmen from the Charente department have recently fallen victim to a fake Belarusian banknote scheme. The victims were offered to "pay" for a service with pre-redenomination Belarusian rubles, writes Charentelibre.fr.

First case: 19-year-old and a "broken card"

On Tuesday, August 18, a 19-year-old young man was driving down the road and stopped to help a family that seemed to be in trouble. The father of the family, who was traveling with a child in a BMW SUV, explained that he needed to refuel.

Citing a blocked card, the man took out a wallet full of banknotes and asked the young man to pay for the fuel with his card, promising to return the money. He agreed and fueled the car for 124 euros. The problem was that the man offered to return the debt in Belarusian rubles.

This raised suspicions in the young man – he didn't understand where such a currency could be exchanged. After brief negotiations, the man offered 1000 rubles, and the guy eventually agreed. Only after returning home and googling it did he find out that such a scheme is quite common: the banknotes are not fake in the full sense of the word, but they are no longer valid. According to the young man, the scammer "looked good, was wearing an Armani T-shirt, and spoke French with a slight accent."

Second case: "800 euros to feed the family"

Another young resident of Charente reported a similar incident to Charente Libre, having fallen for the same scheme. A man aged 35-40, speaking English, asked to have his car refueled.

"He was driving an Audi A6 with his wife and two children. I felt uncomfortable seeing them in such a predicament, so I refueled their car for 101 euros, and in return, the man gave me 500 rubles, which was supposedly worth 152 euros. Formally, I was even making a profit, which made me suspicious. But the banknotes looked genuine, with good watermarks and a strip in the middle," said 25-year-old Dmitry Blanchon.

The scammer didn't stop there: he asked the young man to withdraw another 800 euros to "help" him, citing a lack of euros and inability to feed his family. "That was too much," Dmitry Blanchon admits, "but I still went and withdrew 200 euros from the nearest ATM, which I exchanged for a new batch of 'Belarusian' banknotes."

When the conversation ended and the "deal" took place, the young man photographed the received banknotes to check them using artificial intelligence. That's when he realized he had fallen victim to a scam: the banknotes are indeed out of circulation. He lost a total of 301 euros. The young man filed a police report.

Both cases are a reminder to be careful when strangers on the road ask to refuel their car or withdraw cash in exchange for foreign currency, especially one that is difficult to verify immediately.

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