by Ryan Vagabundo
So I got approached with an oldie-but-goodie last night while staying at a hotel. A scammer called my room around 8 PM trying to pose as the "front desk" to get my "billing information."
I knew it was nonsense from the first few seconds - the front desk doesn't call you for this sort of thing, and the scammer lady's opening line of "This is the front desk, can I have a moment of your time?" immediately marked them as someone with a telemarketing background but no clue how the hotel industry works.
Anyway, this scam has been around for a long time, but apparently it's still working on folks as the scammers are still out there doing it - thus today's PSA.
It works like this: someone calls your room out of the blue on the landline phone, claiming that they're at the front desk and that there's a "glitch" of some sort that caused your billing information to be lost. Then they try to guide you into giving it to them over the phone. They'll probably pepper in some other official-sounding nonsense like "for the safety of all of our guests."
It often happens at a weirdly late hour, with the scammer claiming they're the "night auditor" and that they need the lost billing information to settle up all the day's accounts. The real reason is that they hope they're catching you asleep and that you'll be groggy and confused.
This is usually done at hotels that either allow outside parties to direct-dial rooms, or have some sort of automated system that's easy to compromise. That way they can just auto-dial their way through the rooms instead of trying to go through a switchboard with a manual operator at guest services. There aren't a lot of hotels left where this is still possible, but some do have outdated phone systems that they refuse to update or secure properly.
Under no circumstances should a hotel ever ask for your credit card number (even part of it) over the phone. Dumb scammers might tip their hand by asking for it right away, but most are more sophisticated. They'll try to walk you into it by asking for more innocuous information first. They might even stop short of asking for a credit card number, hoping to get personal information to match to a known database of compromised card numbers and other partial components of identity theft. They might also be phishing for something more humble, like the ability to bill to your room or use your access to the hotel wifi. Or they might try to convince you to turn on your computer or mobile device and visit some shady site.
Whatever the case, anyone calling from the "front desk" at any time asking you to give them ANY kind of personal information (no matter how innocent it might seem) is immediately suspicious and should be treated as a scam attempt. If you don't like confrontation or have any doubt, the easiest way to get out of it is to simply say "OK, I'll stop by the front desk to take care of it" and hang up. Then dial the hotel operator and verify that the call didn't come from them. Scammers won't try a room more than once unless they're particularly dumb.