Travel Fraud: What It Is & How to Prevent It

Travel fraud costs the industry hundreds of millions annually—from payment fraud and chargebacks to sophisticated bot attacks and emerging agentic fraud. 

As fraudsters weaponize AI agents and exploit vulnerabilities across booking platforms, mobile apps, and APIs, travel businesses face mounting financial losses, reputational damage, and regulatory risk. 

This guide breaks down the most common travel fraud schemes, how to spot them, and the layered defense strategies needed to protect your business and your customers.

What is travel fraud?

Travel fraud refers to various scams or deceptive activities perpetrated by fraudsters targeting the travel industry. In 2023, travel and leisure was the number two industry across the globe with the highest rates of suspected fraud at 36%.

On top of that, cyberattacks against hotels have led to huge data breaches just in the last year. Stolen credentials and data from these breaches can then be used to make new, fake accounts to perpetrate travel fraud.

Travel fraud leads to direct financial losses, reputational damage, and potential legal and regulatory issues. With fraudulent activity only expected to increase, it’s more important than ever for businesses in the travel and hospitality industry to protect themselves and their customers from sophisticated fraudsters.

The business impacts of travel fraud

Some reports say payment fraud costs airlines ~1.2% of annual revenue, or around $1 billion every year. 

Data released by Visa in early 2026 showed that European airline fraud losses climbed to $77.7 million annually, with 99% of this reported fraud occurring through e-commerce.

Airlines have a significant opportunity to close these fraud gaps by strengthening their online defenses, as failing to prevent travel fraud can yield significant business consequences: 

• Financial losses: Fraud causes direct losses from fraudulent bookings, chargebacks, and unauthorized transactions, as well as operational costs from investigating fraud cases.
• Reputational damage: Fraud damages customer trust, as travelers will be hesitant to book through the business again, and negative publicity can harm brand image.
• Regulatory & compliance issues: Fraud compromises customers’ personal information in data breaches, which can lead to regulatory fines and legal consequences.
• Negative customer experience: Fraud can disrupt normal operations and lead to service delays or cancellations. Additionally, customer support teams handling fraud cases will likely have longer response times—and lower customer satisfaction.

Why is the tourism industry a target for fraud?

Any industry with high transaction amounts is a good target for fraudsters who want the most “return on investment”. Tourism, therefore, is a prime target for fraud. Here are the main reasons:

• High transaction volume: Tourism involves both a high volume of transactions (bookings, reservations, and purchases) and significantly high transactions (flight tickets, hotel stays, and vacation packages).
• Seasonal peaks: Peak travel seasons come with huge spikes in the number of transactions, making it much easier to hide fraudulent activity.
• Diverse payment methods: Tourism businesses often accept many different types of payments, which increases the potential attack surface, and transactions are often cross-border in nature, making it harder to detect fraud.
• Complex supply chain: Tourism, as an industry, involves many intermediaries (travel agents, tour operators, and online booking platforms) and relies heavily on third-party vendors for services like accommodation and transportation. Both of these things complicate the verification of transactions and create vulnerabilities that can be exploited.
• High customer turnover: Many tourists are one-time or infrequent customers, so there’s no way to establish patterns and detect anomalies for that customer.
• Sensitive data handling: Tourism transactions involve sensitive data like passport details and credit card information, making it a good target for identity thieves.
• Weak security practices: Security measures across different regions and businesses are disparate, leaving gaps for fraudsters to exploit. Additionally, smaller businesses might lack enough resources to implement robust fraud prevention measures.
• Agentic commerce: As AI agents increasingly handle travel bookings and reservations on behalf of consumers, fraudsters are exploiting these same autonomous capabilities to execute fraud at machine speed, making it difficult for travel merchants to tell spoofed AI agents from legitimate ones. 

The 6 most common types of travel fraud

Here are the most common types of travel fraud:

• Fake booking websites: Fraudsters can create websites that look like legitimate travel booking sites to steal personal and financial information from users.
• Phishing: Scammers send emails pretending to be from legitimate travel companies, enticing recipients to click on malicious links or provide sensitive information.
• Chargeback fraud: After booking a trip or purchasing travel services, the fraudster disputes the charge with their credit card company to get a refund, while still utilizing the services.
• Fake travel agencies: Fraudulent agencies offer fake deals or trips, collecting payments from victims without delivering any actual services.
• Account takeover: Fraudsters use stolen credentials to access and exploit legitimate travel accounts, redeeming loyalty points or making fraudulent bookings.
• Bot and AI agent attacks: Automated bots and AI agents can be used to scrape travel websites for pricing data, book and hold inventory, or generate fake accounts and reviews. Agentic commerce also opens up new avenues for sophisticated agentic fraud at scale. 

How to identify travel fraud

Travel fraud can be spotted with a mix of advanced fraud detection tools and monitoring, combined with an understanding of common fraud indicators.

Behavioral analysis

Behavioral analysis looks at the actions and behaviors of an account, searching for suspicious signs such as:

• Unusual booking patterns: Look for multiple bookings from the same IP address or email address, especially if the bookings are for different names or payment methods.
• Rapid-fire transactions: A high volume of transactions completed in a short period can indicate automated bot activity.
• Odd travel routes: Bookings with illogical travel routes or last-minute changes might suggest fraudulent activity.

Payment anomalies

Identifying payment anomalies can indicate fraudulent activity, especially payment fraud and account fraud. Look for:

• Mismatched billing & shipping addresses: A discrepancy between the billing address and the destination or shipping address can be a red flag.
• Multiple card attempts: Several failed attempts with different credit cards may indicate a fraudster testing stolen card details.
• Unusual payment methods: Use of less common payment methods or frequent use of virtual cards could signal fraud.

Verifying user details

Discrepancies between a user’s settings, such as a mismatch between the user’s shipping address and their IP-based location, can indicate fraud. Look for:

• Incomplete or fake contact information: Inconsistent or obviously fake information (e.g., nonsensical email addresses, phone numbers that don’t connect) can be a sign of fraud.
• Unusual email domains: Use of temporary or disposable email addresses can indicate a lack of legitimate customer intent.
• High-risk geolocations: Bookings originating from high-risk regions known for fraud should be scrutinized more closely.
• VPN or proxy usage: Detection of VPNs or proxies might indicate someone is trying to hide their true location.

Technical indicators

Automated bot and agent trust tools can dig into the technical information in every request:

• Bot and AI agent detection: Advanced detection systems can identify patterns typical of both traditional automated scripts and sophisticated AI agents. While traditional bots may exhibit uniform behaviors like identical keystroke timings, AI agents display more nuanced automation patterns—requiring intent-based detection to distinguish malicious AI agents from legitimate ones helping consumers book travel.
• Device fingerprinting: Tracking device information can help identify if multiple bookings come from the same device but are masked as different users.

Transaction monitoring

Focusing on red flags in transactions can stop payment fraud in its tracks and protect your business from the associated costs, like chargebacks and chargeback fees.

• Velocity checks: Implementing velocity checks to track the speed and frequency of transactions can help identify suspicious activity.
• Suspicious booking trends: Monitoring trends such as high numbers of bookings for expensive, refundable trips that are subsequently canceled can reveal fraudulent intentions.

Machine learning

Machine learning can sort through all of the signals you gather to identify patterns that indicate fraud.

• Pattern recognition: Machine learning models can analyze vast amounts of transaction data to identify patterns that are indicative of fraud.
• Real-time alerts: These systems can provide real-time alerts on suspicious activities, allowing for immediate investigation and action.

Modern ML systems must also distinguish between legitimate AI agents assisting customers and malicious agents executing fraud—analyzing behavioral intent rather than just automation patterns.

How to choose the right tool for travel fraud prevention

Before choosing a tool, assess the needs of your business. Determine the types of travel fraud your business is dealing with—such as chargebacks, fake bookings, or account takeovers. Also consider the volume and frequency of transactions to get an idea of the scalability your business requires from a fraud prevention tool.

Travel fraud can be performed by both automated and manual traffic—bots, humans, and AI agents—so your tool should be able to differentiate between the three. Look for a travel fraud prevention tool that includes these core features:

• Behavioral analysis: Sophisticated fraud can be very discreet, particularly when a fraudster is able to take over an existing account. Look for a tool that analyzes user behavior and flags anomalies.
• Machine learning & AI: Advanced, ML-powered analytics help identify and adapt to new fraud patterns, keeping your business safer.
• Real-time monitoring: Detecting fraudulent transactions in real time is the best way to combat fraud and prevent negative impacts on your business. Choose a tool that provides real-time detection and alerts.
• Bot and AI agent detection: Effective bot and agent trust protection means high accuracy and no compromises on either security or customer experience.
• Multi-channel protection: Customers are interacting with your business on websites, mobile apps, and via APIs. Choose a tool that can protect transactions across all channels.
• Integrations & compatibility: The tool should easily integrate with your existing systems, preferably using robust APIs and SDKs. Choose a tool that is also compatible with other security tools you might be using.

Other features to look for include minimal user impact, compliance with various regulations for data privacy, a proven track record, strong customer support, and scalability.

4 tips for fighting travel fraud

Fighting travel fraud requires a layered defense strategy that combines advanced technology with continuous monitoring and team readiness.

1. Deploy real-time fraud prevention

The foundation of any fraud prevention strategy is a powerful detection tool that analyzes every request in real time. Look for solutions that use machine learning and AI to detect and adapt to new fraud patterns—keeping you ahead of evolving threats like bot attacks and agentic fraud. Your tool should include bot mitigation, behavioral analysis, and user verification capabilities. With the rise of agentic commerce, your fraud prevention tool should also analyze behavioral intent to distinguish legitimate AI agents helping customers from malicious agents executing fraud at scale.

Multi-factor authentication adds an essential layer of protection for customer accounts, while dynamic risk scoring adapts responses based on the perceived risk of each transaction or user behavior.

2. Build awareness & industry collaboration

Many fraud schemes involve phishing or spear phishing, which manipulate users or employees into divulging sensitive information. Train your employees to recognize fraudulent activities and educate customers about potential scams through proactive communication.

Collaborate across the industry by utilizing shared databases and block lists to identify known fraudsters, and participate in industry networks to share information about emerging threats and countermeasures. The travel industry is stronger when businesses work together to combat fraud.

3. Maintain compliance & security hygiene 

Ensure your processes and tools comply with data privacy regulations like GDPR and CCPA to safeguard customer information and build trust. Conduct regular security audits to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities in your architecture before fraudsters can exploit them.

4. Monitor everything, automatically

Fraud doesn’t take breaks, which is why you need automated monitoring that reviews every transaction or request without manual intervention. The best fraud prevention tools provide detailed reporting and analytics on your traffic patterns, real-time alerts when suspicious activity is detected, and automatic responses to verified threats.

Protect your business against travel fraud with DataDome

DataDome delivers real-time bot and agent trust management—giving you complete visibility and control over all traffic, whether human, bot, or AI agent. Our multi-layered AI engine analyzes intent in under 2 milliseconds, stopping sophisticated fraud schemes like credential stuffing, account takeovers, bot attacks, and emerging agentic fraud—while letting legitimate travelers through seamlessly.

To learn more about how the DataDome Platform can protect your business against travel fraud, book a demo or run a free Vulnerability Scan to test your defenses today.