War in Iran: fraudulent emails promise shipowners a passage through the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for cryptocurrencies

According to information obtained by franceinfo from the Greek company Marisks, specialized in maritime risk management, at least four shipping companies have received messages from scammers posing as Iranian Revolutionary Guards in recent weeks.

Published on April 23, 2026 at 18:39. Reading time: 3min

In the Persian Gulf, where nearly 20,000 sailors have been stranded on hundreds of ships since the beginning of the war between Iran, the United States, and Israel, a new scam has appeared in the mailboxes of maritime companies. Fraudulent emails, impeccably written in English, promise secure passage through the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for payment in cryptocurrencies. They are signed by a supposed advisor to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, a completely fabricated mention.

The alert was raised on Monday, April 20 by Marisks, a Greek company specializing in maritime risk management, after one of its clients forwarded a screenshot of the received message to its teams. Contacted by franceinfo, the company confirmed the information and detailed the scammers’ modus operandi.

According to Marisks, at least four shipowners have received this fraudulent message and have contacted the company. These are probably the companies that have passed on the information to their maritime security partners. There are likely many more who have received it without reporting it, according to Marisks.

All identified companies received the same type of message, with minor variations in wording for each recipient. The email presents itself as a proper administrative procedure. It offers shipowners a secure passage through the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for payment in Bitcoin or Tether, another cryptocurrency.

The amount is not specified in the email. The scammers specify that it will be determined after a five-day verification on the ship, during which its possible links with the United States or Israel will be examined. For this, shipowners are requested to provide official documents: the maritime transport contract, crew list, and charter party contract.

What stands out when reading the message, according to Marisks, is its high-quality drafting. The English is flawless, and the terminology used is very specific to the maritime sector. In every aspect, the text resembles a document that could have been produced by an artificial intelligence like ChatGPT.

This is also what makes this scam effective. It does not look like an ordinary spam, which caught the attention of Marisks experts. Asked about the elements that could rule out the hypothesis of a genuine request from Iranian authorities, the company highlights several inconsistencies. First, a senior official of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard sending an email to private shipowners demanding Bitcoin without caution and transparency seems highly unlikely. Additionally, this email does not align with official Iranian communication. Tehran has not announced the establishment of an official cryptocurrency payment system to allow transit through the strait. The issue of tolls discussed by some Iranian officials and denied by others has never been raised through this type of channel.

“This is rather scammers taking advantage of the distress of shipowners,” summarizes Marisks. If fraudsters have chosen cryptocurrency, it is because it remains difficult to trace and is their preferred currency in conflict zones and under sanctions.

At this stage, Marisks has no evidence that a company has actually paid and tried to cross the strait following this message. The company has not been aware of any follow-up communication between the scammers and the targeted shipowners, nor any traced transactions.

As soon as it became aware of the email, Marisks alerted its network and spread the information throughout the maritime sector in order to prevent as many companies as possible from falling into the trap. The company reminds shipowners faced with this type of solicitation to systematically verify the authenticity of communication channels before making any payment.

This scam comes at a particularly tense time. Over seven weeks after the start of the war between Iran, the United States, and Israel, the Strait of Hormuz remains largely closed to commercial ships. The United States maintains a blockade of Iranian ports, while Tehran has alternated between opening and closing phases of the strait, with several incidents of shots fired in recent days against ships attempting to pass.