Travel Scams to Watch Out For | #phishing | #scams | #education | #technology | #infosec

Travel scams can cost you money and ruin your vacation, but the results could wind up being a lot worse than that. A hacker or thief who accesses your personal information could steal your identity without you even knowing, in which case you could spend thousands of dollars and several years getting back on your feet.

According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), many travel scams start out with you receiving a call, a text or a flyer in the mail. In any of these communications, you may be promised a free vacation or a luxury cruise at a drastically discounted rate. The catch? They need your credit card to secure the reservation, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. 

“You may end up paying hidden fees — or worse: after you pay, you might find out it’s all a scam,” writes the FTC.

Other common travel scams come in different forms, from broken or missing taxi meters to vacation home scams and fraudulent offers for chartered flights. Either way, you need to know what these scams are and how they work if you want to avoid them.