Farm families in Leitrim advised to be vigilant as online scams rise

IFA Farm Business Chair Rose Mary McDonagh is appealing to farm families in Leitrim to be extra vigilant with their data in the face of online scams.

“I would ask everyone to ensure they double check that who they are dealing with or making payments to are who they say they are; and not to reply to unsolicited text, calls or emails.”

Online scams are one of the frequent ways for scammers to acquire people’s money and McDonagh said the large increase in financial frauds and scams is very concerning.

“Recent reports of the explosion in the number of financial frauds is extremely worrying. The latest data from An Garda Síochána shows an increase of 560% in the number of bank accounts taken over by fraudsters since before the pandemic,” she said.

The IFA Farm Business Chair continued, “the number of phishing frauds, whereby a person is contacted by text, email or phone call and inadvertently reveals sensitive data about their bank account, credit card or passwords has also increased by over 400% in the same period”.

“An Garda Síochána have to be fully resourced to catch and stop these fraudsters and financial institutions should assess their systems to have them as robust as possible to deter fraudsters,” she concluded.

The IFA is Ireland's largest farming rpresentative organisation - protecting and defending the interests of Irish farmers in all sectors for more than 65 years.