Half of the cyber frauds for the purchase of vacation packages detected throughout the country occur in Quintana Roo, warned Eduardo Paniagua, advisor to the Mexican Association of Travel Agencies (AMAV), who regretted that very little is being done to combat this crime.
Paniagua indicated that in 2019, an average of 250 cyber frauds for holiday sales were detected per hour nationwide, but now there is talk of 300 and even 500 frauds per hour, a figure that increases during the holiday season.
The businessman indicated that criminals take advantage of the popularity of destinations such as Cancun, Playa del Carmen, Tulum, Bacalar and Puerto Morelos to commit these crimes. Generally, the scammers pretend to be a Travel agency or a Hotel chain to sell fictitious accommodation, which the victims discover is false when they arrive at the destination. “This damages not only the economy of tourists, but also the name of some vacation centers,” said Paniagua.
He commented that the most common thing is that vacationers do not assume responsibility for having fallen for this type of scam, but rather blame the destination, the Hotel and the service provider itself. He stressed that these frauds are increasing every day and criminals are more up-to-date in cyber matters, in addition the amount of these frauds has also increased year after year.
The AMAV advisor acknowledged the importance of joining forces, including the National Banking Commission and the cyber police, to freeze the bank accounts where victims deposit this money through fraud.
He explained that criminals use all kinds of strategies to deceive tourists with false offers, where they offer incredible prices in the middle of the holiday season, or in other cases they offer the list price, but supposedly give away tickets to parks, nightclubs or tours, in addition to the strategies they use on social networks.
To avoid falling into this type of fraud, Paniagua recommended always purchasing vacation packages from a duly registered Travel agency and not sharing bank details or sensitive information.
As reported by REPORTUR.mxin response to the bombardment of Travel agencies in Yucatan selling very attractive packages on social networks, Jonathan Luviano, representative of the company Hostech, warned citizens about fraud on the Internet, and asked customers to look for companies that are trustworthy. (Yucatan: warning about proliferation of fraudulent agencies).
