The charity has said an international governing body should be set up to deal with internet hoaxers and help prevent them from using charities as a cover to perpetrate international scams.

The charity has recently struggled after small voluntary organisations across the world were sent scam emails telling them they had been offered a grant of £1.5 million to assist with ‘charity development and poverty eradication’. The charity received many responses and could not reply to them all without diverting resources.

“Unfortunately email hoaxes like these are so common and there isn’t one co-ordinated agency which has the power to shut down operations like this,” said Justin Byworth, World Vision’s head of international programmes. “We’d like to see in place a single governing body with extensive powers to tackle the growing issue of internet fraud and hoaxes.”