The Agency for Regulation and Development of the Financial Market of the Republic of Kazakhstan has published a warning on dropper schemes, in which individuals provide their bank cards, accounts, electronic wallets or individual identification number to receive, cash out or transfer other people’s money for a fee. The agency says participation makes a person an intermediary in the theft of funds and can trigger criminal liability under the Criminal Code, ranging from fines to confiscation of property and imprisonment for up to seven years. The notice highlights common recruitment tactics such as promises of easy online income, requests to help an acquaintance, or strangers asking near an ATM to receive and forward money. It identifies red flags including the absence of an employment contract, pressure to start immediately, requests for card and passport photos, SMS codes, banking app logins and passwords, or demands to open new cards and hand them to third parties. Banks detect suspected droppers through transaction patterns such as pass-through transfers of the same amount, very short intervals between transactions, chains of transfers across multiple recipients, and links to accounts involved in fraud. In such cases, accounts may be blocked, explanations and documents requested, services suspended, and information passed to law enforcement, while both third-party funds and the customer’s own money may be frozen. Courts may also recover the full cash amount as unjust enrichment, and banks may restrict new accounts, refuse service, and cut off access to banking services.

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