A bogus email from a UK airport attempted to defraud thousands of people, it has emerged.
The scam used a fake gov.uk address, but the messages were prevented from ever reaching their intended recipients.
It was one of a range of cyber-attacks prevented last year by GCHQ’s National Cyber Security Centre.
More: Industry’s biggest fraud survey launches with firms urged to take part
Anti-fraud awareness campaign to launch for travel industry
NCSC has not revealed the name of the airport fraudsters attempted to impersonate last August.
But it said that the failed scheme involved sending 200,000 emails to consumers asking them to pay a fee in order to receive a larger refund.
Had the intended victims paid the sum, they would have got nothing in return, the BBC reported
The security centre also took the criminals’ real email address offline to ensure they could not receive any replies.
The details were revealed in the NCSC annual report in which it disclosed that it had prevented 140,000 separate phishing attacks.
This refers to the attempted online theft of bank details and other sensitive information by impersonating a trustworthy person or organisation.
The agency also said it had taken down 190,000 fraudulent sites.
More: Industry’s biggest fraud survey launches with firms urged to take part
Anti-fraud awareness campaign to launch for travel industry
