- Two cybercriminals have stolen over $600,000 worth of tickets
- The tickets were primarily Taylor Swift concert tickets
- The criminals used a backdoor into the StubHub systems to redirect the tickets
A pair of cybercriminals have been arrested and charged after allegedly stealing over 900 concert tickets, raking in over $635,000 in profit. This works out to an eyewatering $700 average profit per ticket, so it might not surprise you to hear that the criminals mostly stole from Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, as well as other high profile events like NBA games and the US Open.
The two criminals were employees of ticket site StubHub, and are accused of using their access to company systems to find a backdoor into a “secure area of the network” where tickets that had already been sold were assigned a URL and queued to be sent to the customer. The criminal, Tyrone Rose, then redirected the URLs to his co-conspirator, Shamara Simmons.
The criminals have been charged with grand larceny in the second degree, computer tampering in the first degree, conspiracy in the fourth degree, and computer tampering in the fourth degree – and face up to 15 years in prison if convicted.
High value targets
Scams targeting popular events like sports competitions, shows, and concerts, especially the hugely popular Taylor Swift Eras tour – are common as criminals look to take advantage of the urgency of quick-selling tickets. In this case, the tickets were purchased through a perfectly legitimate site, but customers were still defrauded, which makes this case particularly worrying.
“According to the charges, these defendants tried to use the popularity of Taylor Swift’s concert tour and other high-profile events to profit at the [expense] of others,” said District Attorney Melinda Katz.
“They allegedly exploited a loophole through an offshore ticket vendor to steal tickets to the biggest concert tour of the last decade and then resold those seats for an extraordinary profit of more than $600,000.”