More than half (53pc) of adults in Britain regularly receive fraudulent or scam calls on their mobiles, according to online YouGov research for a call-blocking and caller ID company.
The UK now gets more nuisance calls than any other country in Europe (13pc of all calls), according to Hiya. The research found that nearly one in four Brits (24pc) don’t answer calls from unknown numbers on their mobile phone. On average, three percent of adults that have received a fraudulent or scam call have lost money as a result of this, although this figure rose significantly in Scotland to seven percent of adults.
Defrauding people is big business, says Alex Algard, CEO of Hiya. “Scammers are getting more sophisticated. There are some convincing fraudsters out there using mobile phones to entice people into giving away personal data and financial information. Scammers are particularly good at luring people with the false promise of free money, for example, accident compensation that will never materialise.”
Findings from the research include:
· 53pc of British adults receive fraudulent or scam calls on their mobiles at least once a month
· 35pc of people receive a scam call at least once a week
· 24pc of adults never answer calls from unknown numbers
· Of those that have ever received a fraudulent or scam call, 63pc of respondents have hung up on the suspicious caller immediately, but a significant number have also let the call continue, whether to find out more (14pc), or to simply play along with the person on the other end of the line (25pc)
· On average, 3pc of adults in Great Britain that have ever received a fraudulent or scam call have lost money through this
· 7pc of these in Scotland have lost money through fraudulent or scam calls
Notes on the research:
Conducted by YouGov on behalf of Hiya, had a total sample size of 2055 adults. Fieldwork was undertaken on October 4 and 5, 2016. The survey was carried out online. The figures have been weighted and are representative of all GB adults (aged 18-plus).
