TORONTO | The dream of Florence and Marianne, two Swifties from Quebec, of seeing their idol at the Rogers Center in Toronto almost turned into a nightmare at the beginning of September.
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The four tickets for the November 15 concert that they had managed to obtain when the six dates in Toronto went on sale on August 9, 2023, disappeared from Florence’s Ticketmaster account.
During the night of September 5, one or more computer hackers managed to seize the tickets and transfer them.
“Two tickets are now being forwarded to Joe Doen at [email protected],” read an email they received.
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It was ultimately the four tickets that had been stolen.
“It was total panic,” says Florence who, like her friend Marianne, prefers to keep her last name quiet for fear of being targeted by other pirates.
“I’m going to cry”
Florence immediately called Ticketmaster. “It’s not the first time this has happened and they reassured us,” says Florence.
A fraud investigation was opened and, a week later, the Swifties had their precious tickets back, but not without breaking out in a cold sweat.
“Florence hadn’t said anything to me so as not to stress me out. When she told me that our tickets had been stolen, I told her: ‘Flo, stop, I’m going to cry’,” says Marianne.
“You understand,” she continues, “we’ve been waiting and preparing for a year and a half to see Taylor Swift. It’s a lot of planning for travel, our accommodation, our time off, our clothing. It’s a year and a half that you see practically crumbling before you.”
No peace of mind
Even if they have their tickets, Florence and Marianne admit that they will only have peace of mind once they are seated in the stadium on Friday evening.
“It doesn’t make sense that citizens who collect their money for months to see their favorite artist have their tickets stolen. All this because of poor management of a company which has a monopoly,” protests Florence.
Beware of online tickets
If fraudsters are on the lookout, it’s because Swifties are ready to pay top dollar to see their idol on the resale market. On StubHub, seats at the Rogers Center are offered at prices ranging between $2,300 and $9,000 for six evenings in Toronto.
Be careful, warns Jacques Sauvé, a cybersecurity consultant at Trilogiam interviewed by LCN, 90% of tickets for sale on the web are possibly “scams”.
“Unless it was someone I knew, I would never buy Taylor Swift tickets online,” he warns.
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