British mobile phone operator O2 believes an English grandmother named Daisy could be the secret weapon to combatting the continuing surge in criminals scamming targeting its customers.

And while Daisy – who loves her grandchildren and admits to knowing little about IT – would appear to be the perfect target for scammers, she has one important thing in her favour. She’s actually an artificial creation.

Since she was unleashed by O2 on November 14, Daisy has had more than 1000 conversations with scammers so far, the longest lasting about 40 minutes.

Her life like interactions have be proven to frustrate would-be scammers with her tech-illiteracy, as well as lengthy and irrelevant stories about her grandchildren.

“The newest member of our fraud-prevention team, Daisy, is turning the tables on scammers – outsmarting and outmaneuvering them at their own cruel game simply by keeping them on the line,” Murray Mackenzie, director of fraud at Virgin Media O2, said in a statement.

O2 said it had worked with leading ‘scambaiters’ – people who take on and disrupt scammer networks – to get phone numbers linked to Daisy, added to the target lists used by scammers.

The telco said Daisy’s realistic, meandering conversations occupied the time of scammers and prevented them from targeting real victims.

She has also been useful in exposed the common tactics used by scammers so customers can be warned and better protect themselves.

“Daisy is also a reminder that no matter how persuasive someone on the other end of the phone may be, they aren’t always who you think they are,” Mackenzie said.

Consumers and small businesses reported more than 10,000 scams in the 2023/24 financial year, an 81 per cent increase from the year before, according to the Australian Financial Complaints Authority’s annual review released last month.

The ACCC’s ScamWatch earlier this year reported an 18.5 per cent surge scam complaints in 2023.