Russian Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina did not order mandatory digital ruble pensions in a recently circulated video, which has been identified as a deepfake.
The altered video depicted Nabiullina claiming that Russian pensioners must immediately obtain Mir payment cards or lose their pension payments. It also alleged that pension transfers would soon be made exclusively in digital rubles, and that the government was preparing a restricted list of products that pensioners could purchase with the digital currency.
However, central bank records confirm that Nabiullina made no such statements, and no decisions regarding mandatory digital currency payments have been enacted.
Fact-checkers identified the underlying footage as an edited excerpt from a Bank of Russia press conference conducted on December 19, 2025. The original broadcast shows Nabiullina wearing the exact same attire, a black blouse and a white striped shirt, but neither Mir cards nor the digital ruble were mentioned during that press conference.
TikTok Channel and AI Detection
A second fraudulent video also surfaced, placing the same manipulated audio over footage of Nabiullina addressing the Federation Council, the upper house of Russia's parliament. In that video, the audio track was visibly unsynchronized with her lip movements.
Links attached to the manipulated videos directed viewers to a TikTok channel containing multiple deepfakes of prominent Russian politicians and public figures. The channel routinely takes authentic recordings of official speeches and alters them with artificial intelligence tools to create sensational public announcements.
The manipulation was verified by Zefir, an automated monitoring and analysis system designed to detect fabricated audiovisual content. Zefir utilizes five separate neural network models working together to identify synthetic media.
Central Bank Denials and Payment Rules
Rumors regarding forced transitions to Mir cards or digital ruble pension payments have repeatedly circulated across Russian online platforms. Nabiullina previously addressed and rejected similar claims on July 2, 2026.
During her July remarks, the central bank governor described rumors of mandatory digital ruble transfers for public sector workers and retirees as an absurd myth and a scare tactic. She explained that Russian citizens will always retain full choice over how they receive their money, with options remaining open for cash, standard bank accounts, or digital rubles.
Nabiullina also dismissed similar rumors in 2023, later confirming that any future distribution of pensions, civil service salaries, and student stipends using the digital ruble would remain entirely voluntary.
Under existing regulations, pensioners who choose to receive benefits via a bank card have already had their funds credited to the Mir national card network for many years, meaning the video claimed a requirement that was already standard practice.
The fake video failed to gain widespread distribution across social networks and was not cited by mainstream news media. The investigation into the clip was conducted with assistance from Lapsa Media, a Russian organization specializing in combating online misinformation.
