Earlier this month, people visiting the National Theater Concert Hall’s (NTCH) ticketing Web site (www.artsticket.com.tw) began seeing a pop-up warning about telephone and ATM fraud.
It turns out that con artists have been calling people who booked tickets, claiming to be from the NTCH’s customer service center or its accounting office, and saying that there had been a problem with the ticket order and the payment method needed to be changed.
The purported problems varied from double bookings to inaccuracies with affiliate discounts to a computer system failure.
Photo: TAIPEI TIMES
The customers were then told that their order would be canceled, refunded and a new order placed, but they needed to provide details of their bank or post office accounts and then go to an ATM machine to transfer funds according to the fraudsters’ instructions.
The phone numbers used by the fraudsters varied, but some were made to appear as if they were coming from the NTCH customer service line.
NTCH official William Lee (李君偉) said the first complaint about the scam was received at 5pm on Aug. 30 and that as of last week, more than 600 complaints had been received.
It is the first time that the NTCH ticketing Web site has been targeted by fraudsters, he said in an e-mail, adding that the Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau and the police are investigating.
The NTCH said that once a ticket transaction is completed online, its service center would never call a customer back to request a change to the payment process. Anyone who receives such a phone call should ignore it, or contact the customer service hotline (02-3393-9888) directly or its box offices to report it, NTCH said.
The NTCH has extended the hotline’s hours in response to the scam. The hotline is now open from 9am to 10pm daily instead of the normal 1pm to 5pm, or customers can call the NTCH box offices directly during normal office hours, 9am to 6pm Monday to Friday.
There has been no indication that customers’ credit card information has been hacked, Lee said.
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