GIG HARBOR, Wash. — A Gig Harbor family is now out more than $1,200 after they say concert tickets were stolen from their Ticketmaster account. Fourteen tickets, gone in minutes.
“I instantly felt sick. I felt sick. I panicked,” says Virginia Lasky.
She says she was getting ready for work Wednesday evening when she saw a slew of Ticketmaster emails come in. The emails notified her that her tickets – for upcoming shows and musicals - were sent to someone else. Each ticket was transferred from her Ticketmaster account to a total stranger.
“When I clicked on the tickets, they had one-by-one all been transferred and claimed,” says Lasky.
At first, she thought it must be a mistake, but an online search shows she’s not alone. Dozens of Ticketmaster customers across the county claimed they also had tickets stolen from their accounts.
“More and more I found comments for people on Reddit,” says Lasky. “Just random posts that this is happening everywhere.”
Many of these claims happened in the months following Ticketmaster’s massive data breach. That’s when cybercriminals claim they’d stolen personal information from as many as 500 million customers.
A statement from Ticketmaster reads, ‘Ticketmaster passwords were not exposed in the data incident earlier this year.’ Adding, ‘The vast majority of what we’re seeing is because scammers have accessed a fan’s email account.’
Cybersecurity expert, Jeff Steele, with ‘CMIT Solutions of Seattle’, says breaches are becoming more common. And that those breaches can have a real impact, whether it be stolen tickets or stolen funds.
“Unfortunately, everybody’s a victim,” says Steele. “We’re all victims. All we can do now is try to make ourselves less of a victim.”
Lasky says she’s reached out to Ticketmaster multiple times and was told to wait three to five business days for a response. She’s hopeful she’ll have her tickets returned, but doubts she’ll ever have peace of mind when using the app.
“Even if we get that back, who’s to say it won’t happen again?” asks Lasky.
Here’s what Ticketmaster had to say: “The top way fans can protect themselves is setting a strong unique password for all accounts – especially for their personal email which is where we often see security issues originate. Scammers are looking for new cheats across every industry, and tickets will always be a target because they are valuable, so Ticketmaster is constantly investing in new security enhancements to safeguard fans.”
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