Le Figaro Nice
With already more than 17,000 signatures, a hotelier from the Côte d'Azur intends to win her case with the travel and reservations platform Booking.com following a hack of her messaging system.
This scam caused this professional to lose money, as did her clients.
“Our story then became a digital nightmare
,” she wrote in the preamble to her online petition.
Located in Villefranche-sur-Mer (Alpes-Maritimes), above its popular harbor, the “Le Provençal” establishment was the victim of phishing on August 25, which lasted for almost three weeks.
The hackers managed to make holidaymakers pay a second time by making them believe that a problem had occurred during the first payment.
By providing their bank details, the internet criminals managed to recover the amount corresponding to the stays they had booked.
370 reservations were impacted, estimated Alexandra Duchateau, head of the Riviera hotel, which has belonged to her family for four generations.
As a result of these concerns, it recorded around 80 cancellations between September and October, in addition to numerous messages from customers expressing incomprehension and annoyance.
The owner of the hotel, who is considering filing a complaint, estimates the loot recovered by the scammers from customers between 3,000 and 5,000 euros, not counting the losses she suffered through cancellations.
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Other cases reported
On several occasions, Alexandra Duchateau explains that she tried to contact the Booking.com teams in order to obtain help and a commercial gesture.
In vain.
“They don’t care, they didn’t react by saying it wasn’t true
,” she still gets annoyed.
The door was opened and they let the thieves inside their system.”
The pirates,
“I saw them chatting with my clients in the messaging system
,” she still relates, stunned.
The case of this hotel is not unique.
The hotel and catering union, the GNI, was also concerned, on January 12, about the increase in this type of cyberattack in several establishments, inviting them to leave the site and file a complaint.
A targeted email to members would have allowed hackers to access their personal space (extranet) and implement their fraudulent scheme.
The company Booking.com says it is
“aware”
of the problem, but defends itself against widespread hacking on its site.
“This is not a breach of the systems but a coordinated fraud against partner customers, targeted by phishing emails
,” specifies a spokesperson.
A window is now displayed to warn users never to communicate their credit card numbers.
“We are constantly reviewing and strengthening our own security controls
,” adds the multinational, which promises
“to make significant investments to limit as much as possible the impact of these constantly evolving tactics
. ”
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“They think I’m an idiot!”
“New measures”
in terms of digital security are therefore expected, but Booking.com does not intend, at this stage, to offer any compensation.
By registering on the site, hoteliers can obtain more reservations thanks to better visibility in exchange for a 15% commission.
“They think I’m an idiot!”
, laments Alexandra Duchateau, who closed her hotel for the winter season and who no longer plans to use Booking.com.
With her petition, which many dissatisfied users have signed - the 25,000 mark is envisaged - the Riviera hotelier hopes
to "put pressure to find out where the problem really comes from"
, she explains, but also to coordinate action to group to make itself heard and hope for financial compensation, at least for customers, which it will not be able to reimburse out of its own pocket.