Bogus Olympics Tickets Sold on Internet
An Internet ticket scam is of Olympic scope for victims who have spent thousands of dollars, not to mention days of vacation time, to travel to China for the games in Beijing.
Family members of athletes are among thousands in more than half-dozen countries who reportedly paid hefty sums for seemingly legitimate tickets to the 2008 Olympics. At least some of the victims only found out after they arrived that they had been scammed, reports Reuters.
The victims include David Escarraz of Chicago, who found scant consolation in the promise that his credit card charge of nearly $4,000 for tickets for himself and a partner would be refunded, the news agency writes. Likewise, he was not comforted to hear that the International Olympic Committee, which said this week that thousands had been swindled in such scams, is working to shut down bogus Internet sites that facilitated them.
“That site has been in operation since last fall. It was still selling tickets on July 25, the day before I left,” he says of the one from which he bought his tickets. “If this was a problem for the IOC, why did they wait almost a year to do anything?”
