Internet scammers have created a fake website for the Booking.com online accommodation booking service, according to the Association of Tour Operators of Russia (ATOR). Due to a fake portal, at least three Russian families who tried to book holiday accommodation in Turkey lost their money. A similar problem with the deception of vacationers was also reported in the press service of VTB and a number of other banks. What fraudulent schemes are encountered when renting housing in the summer and how to protect yourself from them – in the material of Izvestia.
Fake from the web
Sunai Sertel, the head of the transfer and excursion company Tulpar Travel, told ATOR specialists about the scheme of swindlers with a fake website Booking.com. According to Sertel, it all started with the fact that three Russian families, strangers to each other, decided go on vacation without resorting to the services of tour operators. All of them found the fake website Booking.com on the Web and tried to book suitable accommodations in the private sector using it.
“Having relied on the reputation of the service, the families made the same mistake – not being able to book housing from a Russian card, they contacted the “owner” of the apartment “directly,” ATOR said in a statement.
For further communication the “owner” of the accommodation invited the tourists to continue their correspondence on Telegram, where he promised to organize their accommodation in Turkey, making a reservation for them on Booking.com along with a transfer. A person with the nickname Alex Rozenblat communicated with users. However, since Telegram accounts are not verified, this name may well be fictitious.
“Tourists transferred the prepayment for the apartments personally to the “owner”, who was in touch with them until the moment they arrived at Antalya airport,” ATOR notes. “Tourists even showed screenshots of a booking that Booking.com allegedly made for them.”
Surprises upon arrival
When the tourists arrived in Antalya, unpleasant surprises began for them. Firstly, Alex Rozenblat erased all correspondence with them in Telegram and stopped contacting them. Secondly, they did not find any applications for booking accommodation in their personal accounts on Booking.com. Moreover, it turned out that at one of the addresses housing is not rented out in principle: local residents were very surprised by questions on this topic from Russian tourists.
“All three affected families met already at the Antalya airport, realizing that they were the only passengers of the arriving flight whom no one met,” ATOR concluded. “The fraudster (and this is predictable) did not get in touch anymore.”
VTB also recorded fraudulent activity during the tourist season. As the bank shared with Izvestia, the attackers create a group in instant messengers or send an SMS in which they offer to earn extra money by evaluating the booking service and hotel photos on the Booking website. In fact, the attackers send the client a link to a phishing site. Then the user is informed about the need to deposit money into a certain account in order to start evaluating not hotels, but various goods of online stores. However, it is not possible to withdraw the “earned” money subsequently.
As Yevgeny Yadrikhinskiy, co-owner of the Kvartirka private housing booking service, explains in an interview with Izvestia, The main task of scammers is to ingratiate themselves with potential victims. The easiest way to do this is by “mimicking” existing Russian and foreign popular services that people trust. The lifetime of such phishing sites is short, and therefore attackers create them all the time.
“In Russia, hotel websites are especially often faked, but in this case, it’s not the hotel guests that are being deceived, but the hotels themselves — unscrupulous agencies “knock out” a commission for guests,” says Roman Sabirzhanov, chairman of the board of the interregional public organization Union of Hoteliers. – In addition, a fake site can report that the places in this hotel have already run out, and then force guests to book in other places.
According to Sabirzhanov, before Booking.com stopped working in Russia, fraud flourished within the service itself: scammers created many fake apartment accounts there. People booked them prepaid through Booking.com and sent prepayments in private messages with landlords. But, having arrived at the place, the tourists discovered that there were actually no apartments. The specialist notes that it is fraudulent schemes related to prepayment for housing that are most common in the summer. Malefactors can accept an advance payment and disappear without providing housing, or settle tourists in other apartments that do not match the descriptions.
Risk zones
According to the founder and CEO of the Russian service for booking hotels and apartments Tvil.ru, Alexei Cherepakhin, schemes with fake resources for booking accommodation are most often used in the most popular tourist destinations during the “hot” seasons – summer and New Year holidays. That’s why tourists should be careful when booking accommodation in the Krasnodar and Stavropol Territories, in the Crimea and in Abkhazia.
“The calculation of the scammers is that the guests are worried about the shortage of places,” explains the interlocutor of Izvestia. — Attackers put pressure on tourists and urge them to pay for the reservation faster, until the object is booked by others.
The fact that many complaints about fraudsters come from the Krasnodar Territory and the Crimea, says Roman Sabirzhanov. He also notes that scammers are trying to steal money from Russians who have gathered at popular foreign resorts through booking schemes. This, in particular, is about such countries as Turkey, Egypt, Thailand, Spain, Italy and Croatia. In turn, Yevgeny Yadrikhinskiy advises to exercise caution when booking accommodation in major Russian cities – Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kazan.
— The main technique of scammers is to create a very attractive offer with an incredibly low price., – says Yadrikhinskiy. — For example, tourists can be offered luxurious apartments on Nevsky Prospekt at the height of the season for 2,000 rubles a day. Here it is worth turning on critical thinking and understanding that in reality such a proposal is simply impossible, which means that something is wrong with it.
Before booking accommodation, an expert advises study all the options in the selected location to understand the average prices. At the same time, you should not believe in too profitable and beautiful options. In addition, if the functionality of the site allows, you need to check how long the object has been placed and whether it has reviews.
Protection Mechanisms
Experts interviewed by Izvestia recommend booking accommodation in the summer only through the official websites of hotels and proven specialized services. In this case, you can send an advance payment only through acquiring.
“Always check the site address before paying — it must be an official resource,” Yevgeny Yadrikhinskiy warns. – At the same time, the use of bulletin boards with direct contacts does not guarantee safety. You should not transfer money directly to people with whom you do not know personally, otherwise you may simply lose your funds.
If a person nevertheless became a victim of fraud when booking accommodation, then first of all it is worth contacting the police and providing all available evidence of fraud. It is important to preserve the evidence: take screenshots of ads, correspondence, money orders, checks, as well as fix link addresses, phone numbers and bank cards.
“Give information about the scammer to the administration of the site where he was met,” advises Yevgeny Yadrikhinskiy. – And also reissue your bank card if there is a suspicion that its data has been compromised.
Finally, Aleksey Cherepakhin advises you to share your experience of meeting with scammers from the accommodation booking industry on social networks. Perhaps such a story will help someone from the acquaintances not to fall for the bait of swindlers.
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