An Internet fraudster was jailed for a year today after wangling credit card details out of surfers by starting bogus sites under the names of famous companies.

Craig Cottrell, also known by the name of Legoland Windsor, received the sentence after Marks & Spencer took matters into its own hands and marched him to the High Court.

The high street retailer said it wanted to safeguard its own customers' bank account details as Scotland Yard was busy being "inundated with similar scams", Ireland.com reported.

M&S also used the civil courts to shut down the 23-year-old, who set up sites under the names of Tesco, Cadbury and Legoland. Cottrell, who had addresses in Reading, Berks, and Skellingthore, Lincoln, used a range of aliases, and last year decided to change his name by deed poll to Legoland Windsor.

He used the sites to get credit card details, and then used them to go shopping online. M&S said he had so far failed to hand over a list of customers who had given him their information.

Mr Justice Lightman said Cottrell's actions "seriously put at risk the reputation of Marks & Spencer." ®

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