A new industry-wide campaign aims to combat the growing menace of cybercrime against travel companies. Secure Our Systems, spearheaded by Prevention of Fraud in Travel (Profit), will be the first campaign of its kind in the trade. It comes just ahead of the launch of an industry ‘blacklist’ of known travel fraudsters, part of new […]
Month: September 2018
Cyber attack at Bristol Airport
Bristol Airport has blamed a ‘speculative’ cyber attack for the failure of its flight display screens over two days. Although the airport said there was no disruption to flights, some passengers complained on social media of baggage delays and lack of communication. Extra staff were drafted in and had to resort to writing flight times […]
Police in Europe Tie Card Fraud to People-Smuggling Gang
Coordinated police raids in Germany and Sweden have resulted in the arrest of two individuals suspected of running a cyber fraud gang that used stolen payment card data to book hundreds of airline and train tickets to help smuggle people from the Middle East into Europe. The EU’s law enforcement intelligence agency Europol, which helped […]
Cold calling ban to reduce fake holiday sickness claims
Abta predicts the government ban on cold calls will reduce the number of fraudulent holiday sickness claims made against tour operators. The new measures prohibiting nuisance calls came into force over the weekend. People will now be given the choice to opt in to receiving calls offering to settle personal injury claims. Previously, people had […]
Cause of BA website hack found
A cyber security firm claims to have discovered a malicious script injected into the British Airways website, which could be the cause of the data hack that affected 380,000 customer transactions. BA said it was unable to comment on a BBC report that said a RiskIQ researcher analysed code from the airline’s website and app […]
BA faces multi-million-pound data breach compensation
British Airways faces legal action for ‘inconvenience, distress and misuse’ caused to passengers who were the victim of a huge cyber attack. Details of the data breach were revealed on Thursday, when the airline announced it had been hit by the cyber attack that had compromised passenger details between August 21 and September 5. Up […]
Stena Line workers targeted in data hack
The bank accounts and personal details of up to 800 ferry workers are reported to have been hacked. Stena Line discovered that UK workers’ data had been accessed by hackers who broke into its systems via fraudulent emails, according to The Sunday Times. The hack follows British Airways disclosure that customer details from 380,000 online […]
Firms not fully alert to dangers of cyber crime
Ben Dickinson, cyber security consultant for technology giant ABB, said the pace of change in the way people work and increasingly sophisticated methods of hacking were a recipe for potential trouble. While some companies are on top of the need to protect their operations and employees, others are naive to the dangers or unwilling to […]
Employee admits cheating hotel out of £16,000
A debt-ridden hotel worker who was struggling with payday loans cheated her bosses out of more than £16,000 so she could keep up with her repayments, a court was told today. Stacy Seabourne, 41, made bogus refunds to her own debit cards from the Tewkesbury Park Hotel where she was employed as meetings and golf […]
Travel pass fraudsters busted after £50k sham
A couple produced and sold hundreds of fake bus and train passes in a £50,000 fraud, a court heard. But the racket was rumbled by railway officials as the passes were too wide for new ticket machines at stations. Police who raided the Wolverhampton home of Steve Taylor found bundles of counterfeit tickets and passes […]
British Airways data breach
British Airways’s boss has apologised for what he says was a sophisticated breach of the firm’s security systems, and has promised compensation. Alex Cruz told the BBC that hackers carried out a “sophisticated, malicious criminal attack” on its website. The airline said personal and financial details of customers making or changing bookings had been compromised. […]
Hackers posing as CEOs over email is increasing
Callous con artists are targeting people who have already been a victim of timeshare fraud to steal more of their cash, it was claimed today. No, you’re not being paranoid. Yes, that urgent email from the CEO could actually be an evil plot. At least, that’s what researchers from global telecommunications company Verizon found in […]
Con artists steal more than £7million from timeshare owners
Callous con artists are targeting people who have already been a victim of timeshare fraud to steal more of their cash, it was claimed today. Victims of ‘timeshare recovery fraud’ across Britain reported losing a total of more than £7million this year between January and July, according to Action Fraud. The average loss was £14,000 […]
Thousands affected in Air Canada mobile app security breach
Thousands of Air Canada passengers’ personal details are suspected to have been accessed in a data breach of the airline’s mobile app. Users who had entered their passport details have been warned that they may have had data stolen. The airline said it has now adopted improved password guidelines. Air Canada said: “There are approximately […]