Irish computer users less susceptible to scammers, survey shows

MORE than a quarter of the country’s computer users have been contacted by internet scammers posing as computer security engineers and a significant number have been duped by the person on the other end of the line.

However, a survey by software giant Microsoft shows that the Irish are less susceptible to deception than many other nationalities.

Microsoft surveyed 7,000 computer users in Ireland, Britain, the US and Canada and found, on average, 26% of people had received cold-calls at home from the scammers claiming to be from Microsoft or a security firm, offering “free security checks”.