A group of Irish banks and financial services organisations have joined together with Web security firms and police authorities to establish a high-tech crime forum.
According to press reports eight banks, along with the Irish Payment Services Organisation (IPSO), the Internet Service Providers Association of Ireland and the Internet Advisory Bureau have banded together to form the council, which will operate as part of the Irish Bankers Federation and meet every two months.
The forum's main aims are to promote an understanding of high-tech crime to identify ways of detecting and preventing cyber crime and to increase public awareness of the threats posed to customers.
Earlier this week Bank of Ireland agreed to compensate victims of an online phishing scam targeting its Web banking customers which is thought to have netted fraudsters around EUR160,000.
The bank had earlier refused to refund customers who fell for the phishing fraud, arguing that the security of the personal log on data being sought in scams is the responsibility of the individual customer - but later quietly compensated those who lost money.
In a statement, the bank says customers that have been refunded by the Bank recently were done so "having reviewed their cases and on the exceptional basis that "phishing" was not widely known or understood by customers and was a relatively new phenomenon in Internet banking in Ireland".
BoI has reiterated its policy that it does not refund customers that are the victims of phishing attacks.
"Personal log on information is the responsibility of the customer, to whom the personal log on information was issued and it is vital to the integrity of the system and the security of the individual's account that this remains so at all times," the bank says in a statement.