Debunking the Instant Sellout Onsale Myth. While some scalpers will pay for these tickets with legitimate credit cards, the worst scalpers do this all with stolen or hacked card information, increasing their scalping profit. Cashing out refers to the general online credit card fraud that occurs when fraudsters use stolen card info to buy the tickets.
In advance or during the ticket buying itself, fraudsters use bots to verify the validity of stolen cards known as carding or identify missing expiry dates or security codes for the stolen cards known as card cracking. Fraudsters, touts, and scalpers use bots for unfair advantage and fraud in every step of the ticket scalping journey. When you think of the people behind ticket bots, you probably conjure up images of a hacker or criminal type, camped out in a basement.
But the reality is different. For example, hospitality agencies can use ticket bots to snag premium seats to include in their package deals. Online ticketing bots have been around for at least 20 years.
Depending on where you live, online ticket bots might be illegal—at least technically speaking. In , the U. It made it illegal to buy tickets to events by evading security measures and breaking purchasing rules set up by the ticket issuer. It also banned the resale of such illegally bought tickets.
The legislation marks the first EU-wide legislation on the topic, and also leaves the door open for member states to pass additional laws regarding ticket resale several already have such laws. The Council of the EU adopted the legislation in November , so EU member states will now have two years to transform the regulations into national law.
Enforceability is an ever-present issue with ticketing legislation. Strong enforcement is necessary to curb illegal behavior. Indeed, when the Ontario ban originally passed, attorney general Yasir Niqvi acknowledged the difficulty of enforcing the bot ban, as many bot operators are located outside of the province. Similarly, in the U. Even when the law was passed, the Congressional Budget Office judged it unlikely that substantial enforcement would take place.
Using bots to scalp tickets is a perfect example of rent-seeking behavior economist talk for leeching that adds no benefit to society. Indeed, the U. Ticketmaster reported that it blocks 5 billion bot attempts every month.
The financial incentive is simply too strong and the threat of legal action too weak to stop malicious bot operators. The U. The newest iteration of bots will continue to outpace and outmaneuver the legal roadblocks.
The onus remains on venues, ticketing organizations, and online platforms to defend against malicious bots during online ticket sales. Public outrage can quickly turn on such organizations, and potential legal actions can follow in its footsteps. Ticketing was the first industry to suffer the plague of bots. So ticketing organizations are best positioned to adapt to the constantly evolving bot threat. A full-fledged plan to deal with ticket bots must span several levels, from concrete technical tactics to comprehensive bot mitigation solutions to larger ticketing strategy.
For example, we know the majority of stolen credentials fail during a credential stuffing attack. Problem solved, simple, clear solution. Take away the incentive and the problem will fix itself.
Ticket resale certainly has a purpose as a service. That's how it's done here in the UK for football sales. We're also introducing legislation to criminalise the use of bots in ticket resale - while you can't be put in jail for the offence, the penalty is an unlimited fine. I have my tickets printed out, does anybody know if they have the power to recind the tickets if they were purchased legally with my pay pal account and took the money not pending.
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Also, do not use this blog to report fraud; instead, file a complaint. Get Email Updates. Federal Trade Commission Consumer Information. Search form Search. His lawyers argued his bots went through the same ticket-buying process as a human, only much faster. He had not hacked the site. Scalpers with bots are competing for tickets that go on sale to the public, but often this is less than half of all the tickets to an event.
The rest are diverted to promoters, agents, labels and fan clubs, or set aside for expensive package deals.
A investigation by the New York Attorney-General found most tickets are pre-sold. To re-use the example of the Rose Bowl, the stadium had , seats, but only went on sale to the public. The Ticket Brokers Association of Australia TBA - the industry body representing ticket scalpers, or 'brokers' - says its members don't use bots and it supports the introduction of anti-bot laws. It also says there's no solid evidence of bot use in Australia. Neither the NSW Government - which wants to ban bot ticket sales - nor Ticketmaster could provide any figures on bot use in Australia.
Even if bots are being used in Australia, stopping them will not give fans access to all the tickets - many of which are being diverted to presale. If you have a 20, seat venue and 18, seats are never sold to the public, how can bots be responsible for those? The primary level is where tickets are sold first - websites like Ticketmaster or Ticketek the two largest ticket sellers in Australia.
This means a ticket seller can "double dip" - collect a fee on the primary market, and then on the secondary. This creates a disincentive to crack down on ticket scalping, or at least introduce more transparency around how many tickets are actually being sold to the public. The proposed NSW legislation includes giving the Government power to order event organisers to disclose the number of tickets available for sale to the public.
Ticketmaster is owned by Live Nation, the world's largest events company. Opinion Read the Latest. By Rafi Mohammed. To Read the Full Story. Subscribe Sign In. Continue reading your article with a WSJ membership. Resume Subscription We are delighted that you'd like to resume your subscription.
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