The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau is said to have received 265 complaints from users who had, in total, lost around £40,000. The scammers, three men and one woman set up two website, namely gigsport com and worldwidetickets com.

These websites sold fake tickets for the Reading Festival and concerts for popular artists such as the Black Eyed Peas and Michael Buble. These non-existent concerts and sporting events made the people lose a lot of money as it duped the people into buying tickets.

The four scammers were then arrested from various locations in City of London, Waltham Abbey and Chingford, east London. After learning about the fraud, the bureau - part of City of London Police - soon launched Operation Cyborg. This operation led to the first arrest.

Tammy Foster, from Birmingham, who is said to have spent £185 on two Pink concert tickets said One time when I did phone up, they were verbally abusive to me, telling me to basically go to Trading Standards, and that nothing was going to get done about it and not to phone their office again”.

The website is still there, say investigators, selling tickets for Cliff Richard and the Six Nations rugby tournament. Det Ch Supt Steve Head, City of London Police's head of economic crime, said that the scammers had been targeting people who were vulnerable, like the elderly group of people. These people were most likely to fall for such online advertisements.