Customers warned of 'virus' phone scam

The Data Protection Commission and Microsoft is warning of a phone scam operating in Ireland.

They say up to 300,000 calls have been made by a company which has Irish links and directors.

The commission is working with gardaí and the National Consumer Agency to initiate a prosecution against this firm.

Diarmuid Hallinan of the Data Protection Commission told Midlands 103 how the scam works.

He explained: "They'll try and persuade the customer to log onto a website to download a file…That file will be a virus or spyware which they'll use to try to capture personal information from you that they can sell."

They will also then ask for credit card details to pay for software to fix the virus that they claim to have found on the computer.