A Cuban publicly reported on social media that she was a victim of a scam through bank transfer, in a case that highlights one of the most prevalent frauds on the island: digital identity theft to steal money via Transfermóvil.
"I was scammed and I’m here to share my experience so this doesn’t happen to you," said Fla Gaché in a video posted on February 26 on Instagram, where he detailed how the scam occurred and warned other Cubans about the danger.
According to his account, he received a text message from someone he knew from his neighborhood, who asked for help making a transfer because he was in a place that only accepted that payment method.
The trust generated by knowing that person was the decisive factor. "It turns out that a girl I know, who even lives in the same area as I do, wrote to me saying she saw that I had posted that I needed to withdraw money from my card," he explained.
The victim made the transfer in a hurry, partly because internet connectivity in her area is interrupted during power outages, which prevented her from verifying the situation calmly. After completing the transaction, she called her acquaintance, who confirmed that her number had been hacked and that it was a scam.
The modus operandi follows a documented pattern in Cuba: scammers access other people's accounts using a technique known as "Ghost Pairing", which involves tricking the phone owner into sharing a verification code, allowing them to link the account to another device without the person noticing.
Once inside, they contact the acquaintances of the impersonated victim and request urgent transfers.
Upon visiting the bank, the response was blunt and frustrating
"The bank explains to me that there is nothing they can do. The only option is for me to go to the police." Transfers made through Transfermóvil and EnZona are designed to be irreversible; Cuban banks cannot refund funds without a court order or proof of a technical error, which leaves victims with virtually no immediate recourse.
The report to the police was also unsatisfactory. The officers' response was to question the victim. "The response was: 'And didn't you know this was happening?'"
In response to that reaction, the woman sarcastically said: "The scammer doesn't come up to you and say... Hello, I'm here to scam you." This type of institutional response is not isolated; the police in Cuba have denied investigating similar complaints in other provinces.
The Cuban woman noted that several people in her circle have gone through similar situations, and that the scammers have even contacted relatives abroad. "They have written to relatives in other countries and have scammed them out of dollars."
He also reflected on the impact that this type of fraud can have on the most vulnerable people: "I have thought a lot about how if it's an elderly person who has only 4,000 pesos from their salary to live on for the entire month and that gets taken away, I don't know what they will do."
In April 2025, Cuban authorities managed to apprehend fraudsters in Sancti Spíritus and Holguín who were operating using the same method, recovering 230,000 pesos. However, these successful cases are the exception.
The Central Bank of Cuba has issued multiple alerts warning that no official administrator from Transfermóvil, EnZona, or banks contacts clients through private messages, yet the combination of energy crisis, urgency, and interpersonal trust continues to be the fertile ground that criminals exploit.
In fact, scammers posing as Transfermóvil technicians have been the subject of specific alerts on the island, highlighting that the problem extends beyond impersonation among individuals and also involves those who pretend to represent official institutions.
"They are doing things that we really don't even know how they are being done, but take care, take care a lot," the victim concluded in their video.
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