Keeping everyone safe online - Glasgow supports Cyber Scotland Week

As part of the annual Cyber Scotland week, the council has organised a range of events for staff and the public to raise awareness of cybercrime that many people can be easily caught out with.

Supported by funding from the Scottish Government, officers have again this year timetabled a series of interactive events to highlight online criminal activity that has become more of an issue during the last couple of years of the pandemic with more people resorting to digital to stay connected.

To kick off the week-long activities, a special public awareness event is being held at the Donald Dewar statue on Buchanan Street from 10am - 4pm on Monday 28 February in partnership with Police Scotland, Strathclyde University, Glasgow Caledonian University, CGI (the council's IT partner), CGI and Glasgow's Golden Generation.

Members of the public will be able to access various tools, visuals and simple games to demonstrate how to stay safe online.

Experts will also be on hand to answer questions and help people who are worried that they might have fallen foul of an online scam.

Local primary pupils have been participating in a cyber themed poetry competition that we will be asking the public to vote on - with the winning school awarded a £100 book token.

Kenny Meechan, Glasgow City Council's Head of Information and Data Protection Officer said: "Each year we have delivered a series of interactive events to help raise awareness of cybercrime and help people not fall foul of the fraudsters.

"During the pandemic, with lots more people working from home and using various devices to stay connected we have seen an increase in criminal activity targeting both businesses and individuals. 

"There have been more examples of tailored phishing and ransomware scams relating to the current environment, such as counterfeit PPE or fake 'you have covid' texts being sent. This is in addition to other topics in circulation such as fake tax refunds, pet sale scams, fake holiday refunds and parcel delivery charges fake websites.

"Criminals have worked hard to try and capitalise on more people using online devices by creating an urgency and need around the context - to get you to engage and click or download dangerous malware in an attempt to steal your identity and personal information."

Find out more from https://cyberscotlandweek.com/