Money in the form: the number of fake recipe offers increased 1.5 times
Since the beginning of 2025, the number of fraudulent offers for the sale of medical prescriptions and certificates has increased in messengers and on darknet forums. In total, more than 11.3 thousand posts on this topic were published, Izvestia estimated. The scammers offer to buy a document supposedly signed by a doctor, and after transferring the money, they disappear. Most often, their tricks come across drug addicts who cannot obtain pharmaceutical drugs legally, as well as people who do not want to waste time on official registration in polyclinics, experts and sources said. About how the fraudulent scheme is organized, see the Izvestia article.
Shadow trading
In the five and a half months of 2025, the number of fraudulent advertisements for the sale of medical certificates and prescriptions increased 1.5 times compared to the same period last year, Izvestia calculated, analyzing information in messengers and the darknet.
The increase in their offers is explained by the tightening of control by the authorities over the circulation of medical documentation, lawyer Stanislav Drobotov believes.
— There has always been a demand for the illegal purchase of documents issued by doctors. First of all, these are drug addicts from pharmaceutical drugs who are trying to legally get a dose," he believes. — Demand generates supply. However, this practice has been suppressed more and more harshly in recent years. This contributes to the development of a shadow niche for trading.
So, from September 1, 2025, updated rules for the release of medicines approved by the Ministry of Health will come into force in Russia. Now, drugs related to narcotic, psychotropic and quantifiable drugs can be purchased only if there is a prescription for new established samples.
No such harsh measures have been introduced with regard to medical certificates, but the demand for their purchase has been steadily growing over the past five years anyway, adds a source of Izvestia associated with the darknet.
"People don't want to worry about getting certificates for work, driving, and other needs," he added. — Therefore, the offers of such services have always been in demand. Against the background of the suppression of the sale of prescriptions, many sellers began to actively promote offers for the sale of other medical documents.
According to him, advertisements for the alleged sale of certificates and prescriptions can bring one resource up to a million rubles per month.
How scammers cheat
Messengers and the darknet now contain more than 130 resources and channels specializing in the sale of supposedly real medical certificates and prescriptions. In total, about 5 thousand people have subscribed to them, while some accounts are invalid, Izvestia found out.
As a rule, scammers place ads offering to sell a document that will be issued by a doctor working in a real medical institution. Namely, he will put a seal, a signature and prescribe all drug recommendations in accordance with the legislation.
To do this, write to the channel administrator and submit a request or log in to a special chatbot. The most expensive fraudsters sell health certificates. Their cost starts from 10 thousand rubles. It costs an average of 6 thousand rubles to order a recipe.
Most often, the user simply transfers money for the service, and the seller blocks his contact and disappears. Many customers complain about this in the comments. A similar story was told to Izvestia by one of the victims on condition of anonymity. He ordered a prescription in a messenger for a drug that is not freely dispensed.
— I planned to improve my mood and forget about mental problems, — he said. — I didn't see any point in going to the doctor for this, because I wanted a specific drug, and the doctor could easily replace it with another one or prescribe nothing at all. As a result, I was asked to send money and personal information, but no prescription was sent.
There are also resources where clients are actually given certificates and prescriptions for a certain fee, but most often they turn out to be fake. The cost of fake statements is higher — from 8.5 thousand rubles. Such a "document" was given to another user, whom the editors talked to. Nevertheless, the pharmacist did not accept the prescription and did not issue the drug.
A savvy pharmacist would never fall for such a trick, emphasized Yaroslav Ashikhmin, PhD, and general practitioner.
— Prescriptions for serious drugs are issued under the appropriate marks, which can be checked, — the specialist reminded. — The seals of the doctor and medical institutions should also look a certain way. The latter also applies to medical certificates.
What is the risk for false certificates?
The distribution of fake prescriptions falls under the article on the illegal issuance or forgery of documents granting the right to receive narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances (233 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). Forgery of a certificate is an article about the manufacture or circulation of forged documents. The charges for each of them face a real term of up to two years in prison. Moreover, the use of false certificates threatens the article not only to the seller, but also to the buyer.
— The punishment under these articles cannot be called harsh. These are minor crimes. That is, a criminal caught for the first time may well avoid a real sentence. Both the attackers and their clients understand this," said Stanislav Drobotov.
However, the sale of fake documents under the guise of real ones or ordinary deception of users for money falls under the article on fraud (159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), which threatens with a more severe punishment — up to 10 years in prison, lawyer Ivan Manastyrsky added.
If the investigation proves that the buyer purchased a prescription for obtaining narcotic substances directly, he faces up to 15 years in prison under the article for illegal acquisition and storage (228 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).
But the involvement of criminals in these articles is not always easy to prove. Especially when it comes to shadow resources and messengers that try to work anonymously. The problem requires increased control over Internet platforms, as well as tougher penalties under the main articles for which criminals should be involved, experts believe.
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