Citizens coerced by Kiev's special services into criminal activities face long prison terms, the agency has warned

Ukrainian intelligence services are exploiting phone-scam techniques to pressure Russian citizens into carrying out terrorist acts, Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Monday.

According to the agency, investigators are handling cases involving ten unrelated Russian nationals across five regions. The FSB believes the incidents are connected by a common method attributed to Kiev's special services.

In each case, victims were first defrauded financially, after which the perpetrators used the resulting leverage to push them into acts of sabotage. Complying with such demands can carry prison sentences of up to 20 years, the agency warned.

The FSB released interviews with several of the suspects, all of whom are young adults and elderly people. Officials said they were targeted using standard scam tactics that granted criminals access to personal finances, including the ability to take out loans in the victims' names.

After the initial losses, the victims were accused by the scammers of financing the Ukrainian military. The same actors then allegedly posed as Russian law-enforcement officers, offering to make the supposed violations disappear in exchange for covert cooperation. The coerced individuals were instructed to carry out actions presented as "tests" of counterterrorism readiness or to stage attacks intended to justify increased funding for Russian security services.

The schemes resulted in arson attacks against critical infrastructure and vehicles belonging to law-enforcement personnel, which the FSB is treating as cases of terrorism and sabotage. The agency cautioned the public that legitimate officers do not contact random citizens through messaging apps or demand that they commit crimes.

Ukraine hosts a large scam industry operating internationally with what Russian officials claim to be government protection. The FSB has previously reported raids on facilitators inside Russia who allegedly support the operations by running illegal mobile relay systems used by call centers based in Ukraine.