OLDER Scots are being given master classes in how to protect themselves against online fraudsters in a new anti-cyber scamming initiative run by police and the prosecution service.
Around 50 people over the age of 65 have already received advice from a course which began yesterday about how to keep their personal and bank account details safe online.
Tips offered include changing passwords regularly, using passwords difficult for hackers to crack and never giving away security or login information.
Police Scotland and the Crown Office organised the pilot course at Satrosphere Science Centre in Aberdeen, where they worked alongside Silver City Surfers, which promotes computer literacy among older people.
Sessions will be rolled out elsewhere in the country over the next two years.
Liz Hunter, volunteer co-ordinator with Silver City Surfers, said: "The presentation was informative. The overall message was don't be afraid of the internet, but be aware of how it can be used by criminals."
Courses are being aimed at elderly people because they are seen as easy targets by criminals.
Cyber scamming includes any type of fraud that uses email, web sites, chat rooms or message boards to carry out scams.
Criminals often try to gather personal details from computer users to sell to other fraudsters.
Information such as names, addresses and phone numbers, email addresses and passwords can be sold for £20 or £30, with the criminals making huge sums of money by gathering and selling such personal details.
Among those caught for online fraud include Lee Elwood, from Glasgow, who was jailed for four years at Leeds Crown Court in 2005 after a £6.5million sting. He and another fraudster used spam-emails to defraud computer users out of account details. Elwood, then 25, was convicted for conspiring to launder the proceeds of phishing - the technique used to gain personal information for identity rackets.
CIFAS, the UK's fraud prevention service, estimates around £341m has been lost to cyber scams across the UK during the previous 12 months.
In one case, a 78-year-old woman received a call from someone reputedly being from the bank's "fraud squad". She was told that large withdrawals had been made on her account and that staff were checking that these had been authorised by her. She refused to give details of her bank card number and later discovered the "official" was bogus.
David Bernard, equality ambassador for age at the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, said it was particularly "detestable" conmen should prey on the most vulnerable in society.
Detective Inspector Eamonn Keane, of Police Scotland, added: "Police Scotland is committed to keeping people safe both in the virtual and real world."
l The banking umbrella group BBA has launched a fraud awareness campaign after a poll for YouGov revealed four million Britons could be taken in by internet and telephone scams.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article