The Bulgarian Red Cross (BRC) says a message offering a one-off payment of €300 per person is fake.

The message says the money is aid from the BRC, backed by the UN World Food Programme. "The BRC runs no such programme and does not take applications for this payment," the organisation said in a statement.

The websites named in the message do not belong to the Red Cross. It has not given anyone the right to collect applications, personal details or bank details through them.

The BRC called the use of its name "an unacceptable abuse of the public's trust in the organisation and its humanitarian work". It says the name is being used wrongly to trick people with the promise of an instant payment.

The BRC urges people not to open the links or fill in any forms. They should not share personal data, bank card details, passwords or verification codes. They should report the message as a scam on the platform where they got it, and not forward it. Anyone who has already given out bank details or access codes should tell their bank at once.

The BRC says this may be fraud or an attempt at fraud, if the legal conditions are met. Investigators, prosecutors and the courts will deal with the case and any criminal liability.

Official information on its programmes, campaigns and conditions for aid is at www.redcross.bg and on the BRC's official channels.

At the start of the year, the organisation also denied claims that it was drawing up aid lists because of a declared state of disaster. It then called on people to rely only on official information from the executive authorities and the BRC.