UK government warns of £1.6 million in ticket scams ahead of Oasis and Glastonbury
On the eve of Glastonbury, British music lovers are being urged to take caution over last-minute tickets for sale on social media, after new figures revealed that the amount lost to ticket fraud more than doubled to £1.6 million in 2024.
The government has issued the warning as part of its wider crackdown on scammers and online fraud. With a host of tours and festivals due to take place this summer, including the Oasis reunion tour kicking off in July, new Action Fraud data released by the Home Office on Tuesday (24 June) found the public lost more than £1.6 million in scams related to concert tickets in 2024 – more than double the figure from the previous year.
Around 3,700 gig ticket fraud reports were made to Action Fraud in 2024, with almost half of them referring to offers made on social media platforms. The government has called on tech companies to go further and faster to protect the public from the fraudulent offers being advertised on their platforms.
The data shows that people in their twenties were most likely to become victims of ticket fraud last year, accounting for 27% of all victims, with fraud the most commonly experienced crime in the UK, affecting 1 in 15 adults each year, the government is taking further steps to crack down on the scammers behind the surge in fraud over the last decade, including through a new ban on SIM farms, technical devices which facilitate fraud on an industrial scale.
“Fraud is an absolutely shameful crime, and today’s data shows that anyone can be a victim,” said Fraud Minister Lord Hanson.
“While millions of Britons are getting ready to attend concerts this summer, the scammers are getting ready to exploit the desperate search for tickets, posting fake messages on social media sites offering to resell tickets they can’t use, or making last-minute offers from fake ticket companies.”
