2012 announces crackdown on ticket touts 21/02/2011 |
|
| |
| |
London 2012 organisers are setting up a website checker to allow ticket buyers to verify if the seller is genuine.
UK residents should apply for tickets via the London 2012 website and every country has its own authorised outlet.
But organisers and police are concerned hundreds of bogus websites will spring up when tickets go on sale on March 15.
More than 30 people have been arrested so far in connection with alleged ticket scams related to the Games.
Paul Deighton, chief executive of Games organiser Locog, said a website checker would be in place by the time tickets go on sale next month.
Users will be able to paste the URL of a site into a box to find out if it is genuine.
If the site is fake, they will be redirected to the correct ticket seller for their country.
The Metropolitan Police has a specialist unit dealing with the threat of organised ticket fraud at the Olympics, including bogus websites, fake tickets and touting.
Operation Podium has launched nine operations and made 32 arrests since being set up in June 2010, reports the BBC.
Detective chief inspector Nick Downing said: "Any criminal looking to exploit the Olympic economy will come on our radar – we will be watching them and we will target them."
Downing added that Operation Podium had compiled a list of "hundreds, moving to thousands" of touts who would be monitored in the run up to the Games.
Many of them were persistent operators who had previously targeted the football World Cup in South Africa, Winter Olympics in Vancouver and the Beijing Olympics.
He continued: "We don't believe this is low-level touting – it's organised crime with a business model and we are looking to disrupt that business by seizing assets."
|
| Back |
| |
| |
|
|
 |
Advertisement
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
