Virgin Media O2 is asking all of its UK customers to be careful when they receive texts telling them they’ve won a gambling prize. The company has blocked over 600 million scam messages so far this year, which is double the total seen in 2023 and 2024 combined.
Not all of these messages get caught, which is why the telecoms firm is urging people who receive such messages to report them as junk or forward them for free to 7726.
tell the recipient they’ve won rewards, prizes, or free credit on a site
Gambling-related fraudsters tell the recipient they’ve won rewards, prizes, or free credit on a site before prompting them to give their personal information, such as bank details, to receive their payout. These are the most common types of fake messages, followed by ones where the scammer pretends to be the recipient’s child and those issuing fake parking fines.
Virgin Media O2 Director of Fraud Prevention Murray Mackenzie remarked that scammers are constantly evolving and developing new tactics to target vulnerable people. He’s calling on people to spread the word about these latest trends.
