West Midlands computer users warned: Internet fraudsters conning more victims

In the past five months 1,807 scams have been reported in the West Midlands, including online shopping and auction frauds and advance fee frauds, where people are duped into paying a fee for the promise of goods or cash that never materialise.

One fraud that has been reported with increasing regularity is the 'Microsoft phone scam', which has nothing to do with the software giant and has been around since 2008.

The scam – which government experts describe as 'sophisticated and difficult to prevent' - involves a caller claiming to be from Microsoft Technical Support telling victims their computers have been infected with dangerous malware.

Victims are directed to a a screen on their computer which lists error reports - then charged up to £100 for their removal. In reality the errors are harmless - a normal part of every computer log which do not need removing.

Shropshire businessman Ken Powell fell foul of the scam after being told he would lose all his work files if he did not take immediate action.

The 80-year-old said: "All of my work files are on my laptop and I couldn't afford to lose them. I was told to look at the Event Viewer and there were hundreds of errors listed.

"It all seemed so plausible. The caller knew my name and said he was from Microsoft, so I had no reason to suspect anything."

Mr Powell, from Ryton, near Shifnal, paid £100 to have the malware removed and a three-year protection policy. But the scam did not end there.

In order to remove the apparently dangerous files the caller told Mr Powell he needed remote access to his computer.

"He asked for my IP address and the next thing I knew he was controlling what was happening on my laptop screen," he said.

"He could have been doing anything. All manner of files were being opened. At the time I was just relieved he was helping me preserve the work material on my hard drive."

The next day Mr Powell took his laptop to a reputable computer dealer - only to be informed it had been infected with malware and spyware.

"I felt like a right prat," he said. "I basically paid £100 to have my computer filled up with viruses."

Mr Powell is not alone in falling victim to online fraudsters. The national fraud reporting centre Action Fraud received 17,000 reports of computer-related scams last year involving hacking and the use of spyware.

There were also 55,000 online shopping frauds.

"Firstly the scam encourages victims to pay anything from £20 to several hundred pounds to have remedial work done on a problem that doesn't exist.

"But the more dangerous aspect occurs when they gain remote access to someone's computer. They are brilliant sales people and IT experts.

"Once they have gained a victim's confidence and accessed their computer they are very swiftly able to do anything they want.

"So not only are they potentially taking money to solve a non-existent problem, they can also download anything they want from your computer, such as bank details, as well as upload malicious software."

"We estimate a high proportion of this crime goes unreported, chiefly because people are too embarrassed.

"But the more people come forward, the easier it becomes for us to get the word around and try to prevent this from happening. It is vital people take care when responding to cold callers."