Scammers often pose as legitimate organisations such as Government departments to make people panic into contacting them and handing over personal information.

A victim’s data can be used by criminals to steal their money or to commit identity fraud such as taking out a loan in their name.

This fraud appears to be rife as HMRC has had some 66,000 reports of this type of phone scam in the last year.

More than 140 bogus phone numbers have been removed over the past year in efforts to stop the scams.