Olympic Swimmer’s Identity Exploited in Fake Oasis Ticket Scheme

An Olympic swimmer has reported that his identity was stolen by scammers who attempted to defraud students into purchasing counterfeit Oasis concert tickets. Oliver Morgan, a student enrolled at the University of Birmingham, became aware of the situation only after an Instagram follower messaged him, indicating their intention to transfer money for gig tickets once they had a stronger mobile signal. The scammer had been using WhatsApp to conduct sales negotiations with students, impersonating Mr. Morgan. “It’s kind of demeaning… it’s quite scary that it can so easily be done,” the swimmer stated. The perpetrator established a fraudulent profile on Facebook and advertised tickets for an Oasis performance on a page utilized by students at the university. “It just said: ‘Oasis tickets for sale, if you’re interested message me on this WhatsApp number,’ which obviously wasn’t my number,” Morgan, who hails from Shropshire, informed the BBC. Mr. Morgan himself had been blocked by the scammer, preventing him from seeing their activities. Fortunately, the other student did not transfer any funds to the fake account. Demand for tickets to see the band has been exceptionally high since brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher announced their first reunion tour since 2009. When their UK tour was announced in August, 1.4 million tickets were made available, but more than 10 million fans from 158 countries joined the queue, leaving many without tickets. Morgan suspects that the individual behind the account used a photograph of his lost student ID as “proof” that he was the one selling the tickets. A picture of the ID had previously been posted on the same Facebook page, with a message stating it had been found and handed in. “It was my name, my profile picture… they’d certainly done a good job of trying to scam people with it,” he commented. He further mentioned that the account had been reported to Facebook for impersonating him. Follow BBC Shropshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram. Copyright 2024 BBC. All rights reserved. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking.