Many people still fall into the "trap" when booking hotel rooms online.

Enough tricks…

Before searching for “prey”, the subjects created fake fanpages of accommodation service businesses and used the previous promotional images and videos of these accommodation establishments to post, creating prestige for the fake fanpages. After that, the subjects continuously ran fake fanpage ads on the social networking platform Facebook to find “bait” with very attractive promotional content. For example: “Book 1 night, get 10% off, free lunch buffet ticket. Book 2 nights, get 15% off, free dinner ticket to enjoy live music every night, free shuttle bus to take guests for a walk. Book 3 nights, get 20% off, free lunch and dinner tickets at the hotel…”.

More sophisticatedly, the subjects also use fanpages with a blue tick (showing verification of ownership for the account), even using tricks to increase virtual interactions, comments, and good service reviews to create initial trust for the "prey". When customers interact, the subjects will send images and service quotes for customers to choose from; at the same time, continue to offer attractive incentives to lure customers such as: a further 5% discount if depositing 50% via fanpage and a further 10% discount if depositing 100%.

When customers hesitate to make a deposit online, the subjects continue to strengthen the victim's trust by sending a booking confirmation form or an invoice with full information of the deposit receiving company; at the same time, instructing on the transfer methods for deposit.

After transferring the deposit, the customer will receive a call confirming that the money has been received. However, the transfer content is not as requested by the fanpage. Therefore, the scammer group requires the victim to transfer the money a second time with the correct content so that the system can confirm the successful deposit and promises to return the money transferred the first time. After two transfers,scam groupThey started to take advantage of the victim's psychology that they had transferred money twice and wanted to get their money back, then introduced them to connect with the company's accountant for instructions on how to get their money back and continued to lure and lead the victim into the "matrix" of fraud that had been set up. When the victim ran out of financial resources and discovered that they had been scammed, the group cut off contact and took all of the victim's money.

Using the above tricks, recently the subjects defrauded and appropriated more than 1 billion VND from a woman in Hai Phong City when booking a room at a tourist area in Ninh Binh province (old).

In Quang Ngai province, in July alone, there were dozens of cases of similar traps with hundreds of millions of VND. A typical case is that of Ms. NTT (residing in Truong Quang Trong ward, Quang Ngai province). With the intention of rewarding her daughter with a 3-day, 2-night trip to Da Nang city before her daughter entered university, Ms. T was scammed out of a total of more than 250 million VND when booking a room online at a fake blue-tick fanpage of a tourist accommodation facility in Da Nang city.

Another victim - Ms. PTCV (residing in Cam Thanh ward, Quang Ngai province) shared: "After interacting with the fake fanpage and transferring more than 5 million VND to deposit a room in Quy Nhon ward, Gia Lai province, I promptly discovered that I had been scammed after the subjects asked for a second transfer because of incorrect content". It was hard to believe that before that, Ms. V herself was very vigilant, even propagating to relatives and friends about some common scams on the internet. "However, just because of a little carelessness, I became a victim of professional scammers", Ms. V shared more.

Stay alert to avoid falling into the trap

“Currently, the blue tick icon on a Facebook account can be obtained by registering for a service or using tricks to bypass Meta (Facebook's parent company), or users can pay a monthly fee to get the blue tick; therefore, Facebook accounts with a blue tick are not always the "official" accounts. Many social network users in Vietnam mistakenly think that this is an official fanpage, thereby interacting, providing personal information, boldly transferring money without knowing that they have fallen into the trap of scammers", said an officer from the Department of Cyber ​​Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention - Quang Ngai Provincial Police.

Taking advantage of the psychology of many social network users who often trust accounts and fanpages with blue ticks and mistakenly believe that these are the official accounts of accommodation establishments and resorts - scammers have thoroughly exploited and taken advantage of this psychology to increase fraudulent activities in the form of booking hotel rooms and homestays via fanpages on holidays, Tet, early spring, summer...

In addition, there are some cases where people are scammed but are afraid to report to the police because the amount of money they have been scammed is several million or more than ten million VND. Many people also do not share publicly on social networks because they are afraid of being laughed at. This is one of the reasons why online booking scams are increasingly popular, resulting in thousands of people being at risk of becoming victims of scam networks every day.

“We recommend that people be vigilant against pages advertising unusual hotel room discounts; when in need, people need to carefully research information about tourism service providers in general and tourist accommodation establishments in particular before booking services. When making payment transactions, people should only book services on official websites and fanpages of tourism service providers provided by local tourism management agencies or through reputable service booking platforms. In case of suspicion of fraudulent activities or property appropriation, it is necessary to immediately report to the nearest police agency for timely support and handling,” Senior Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Ngoc Thanh, Head of the Department of Cyber ​​Security and Prevention of High-Tech Crimes of Quang Ngai Provincial Police, advised.