Over 68 Japanese hotels on Booking.com hacked
Hackers steal various information from hotels, send spoofed emails
At least 68 hotels in Japan that transact with the globally recognized accommodation booking platform ‘Booking.com,’ have been hacked, resulting in customer information leakage. As a result, online scams exploiting this information have been occurring in Japan, according to a report by Asahi Shimbun on the 12th.
According to the report, most of the cybercrimes involving Booking.com began with criminals posing as travelers and sending English emails to the hotels.
Criminals exploited these emails, which could spread viruses, to steal the username and password hotels use to connect to Booking.com and information about Japanese visitors.
After obtaining this information, they illegally accessed Booking.com and sent scam emails to hotel customers, impersonating Booking.com and claiming that “advanced payment is necessary.”
They have persuaded customers to make credit card payments using scam email instructions extracting credit card information.
According to an analysis by a security company, Asahi reported that there is a possibility that the individuals who sent emails to hotels posing as travelers are related to Russian hackers.
Furthermore, the operator of Booking.com admitted that such damages are occurring not only in Japan but also in various parts of the world.
Asahi reported, “Crimes of the same method have been spreading in Europe, the United States, Asia, and Oceania since around November last year,” and “the number of victims is increasing as immigration restrictions due to COVID-19 are being eased.”
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