While many Kiwis will be looking forward to getting away for some rest and relaxation, it pays to check the dwelling of your dreams actually exists.
In the UK, 10 Downing St recently appeared as a holiday rental. The prime minister’s pad was offered as a £55 a night getaway in the heart of London.
The bogus listing was an orchestrated stunt to expose the flaws in the online booking system.
Fourteen people applied during the 20-minute test.
Netsafe chief online safety officer Sean Lyons says the same scams are "absolutely" happening here in Aotearoa too.
"People are experiencing these kinds of problems, both with properties that they book here in New Zealand and properties that they book overseas," Lyons said.
"So, we’re certainly not insulated from this kind of problem."
Lyons said a red flag people should look out for is "whether or not the story starts to come undone".
"We’ve probably been through bookings that are a normal process – find a place, book it, pay for it, stay there," he said.
“When things start to deviate from that, when we get contacts from people directly telling us that the payment didn’t work and they want to send us a link to another payment platform or they want to communicate with us off-platform ‘cause they want to avoid the booking fee, all of these things can be signals of ‘something’s not going right’.
"That 'not going right' could be a journey down the road to us finding ourselves at a fairly significant loss."
Lyons said compared to the considerable time, effort and photo manipulation skills needed 10 years ago, artificial intelligence was "undoubtedly" making it easier for scammers to trick would-be holidaymakers.
"The tools that are in people’s hands are making it easier to make those scams look just that little bit more convincing."
Lyons said it shouldn’t just be up to the consumer to protect themselves from fake listings.
"It’s the industry that has the ability to see the patterns, to see what’s going on, to watch the progress and compare one listing to another," he said.
"The burden shouldn’t be on us as consumers; it really should be on them to change what it is that they’re doing because they’ve got the power to do that."
However, Lyons said consumers should "keep an eye out" for ourselves as another layer of protection.
"Make sure that things are working as we’d expect them to and if things do start to fall off the perch, then we need to take some action to protect ourselves because often, once the money’s gone, then that’s where the real trouble for us starts, trying to get ourselves back onto an even keel."
For people who have been duped now trying to recoup their losses, it all depends on the method that was used to pay for the listing.
"When we spend money and we use the banking system, we use credit cards, those things become easier to get our money back," he said.
Scammers will often use methods such as wire transfers and cryptocurrency – the "kinds of things that makes it much more difficult for us to get that money back, makes the process much harder and ultimately, unfortunately, can lead to the worst possible results".
"The quicker we act, the better. As soon as we realise something’s gone wrong, encourage people to take action as quick as they can but there are some cases where that money simply has gone."
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