Irish people conned out of €8.6m by fraudsters in first half of last year, new figures show

In one incident, a woman in her 50s who had received some inheritance invested €70,000 in what appeared to be a legitimate scheme but turned out to 'an elaborate scam'.

Fraudsters are getting more sophisticated and convincing in their attempts to trick the Irish public, as new figures show a 26% jump in scams in the first half of last year.

Fraudsmart, an initiative of the Banking and Payments Federation of Ireland, said victims were conned out of €8.6m in the first six months of 2023 through authorised push payment fraud, involving online and mobile banking transfers.