Halloween fans warned over scarefest scam

Venues across the UK have issued a warning to Halloween fans after tickets to "scarefest" events were sold in a scam.

Halloween Nights Fear, the company behind the sales, has listed 10 events across England, Scotland and Wales, despite three hosts confirming the listings are fake.

Tickets for the events, scheduled from 20 October until 1 November, range from £14 to £140.

Technology expert David McClelland said he believed artificial intelligence was used to create the "convincing" website. The company has been contacted for comment.

The Halloween Nights Fear website, which was launched in July, said the events would include "candle-lit ghost hunts, haunted houses, after-dark walks and scare mazes".

They are listed in London, Liverpool, Bristol, Southampton, Leicester, Salford, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Swansea.

Cardiff Castle, Bradgate Park in Leicester, and Transport for London have confirmed three of the events are fake.

The hosts of the other seven events have been contacted, but have not responded.

However, the BBC cannot find any evidence of the events apart from the listing on the company's website.

Technology expert David McClelland, who appears on the BBC's Rip Off Britain, said the website was one of the most "sophisticated" of its kind he had encountered.

"The website looks so convincing," he said. "It's one of the most impressive scams I've seen - there's so much content on there.

"Sometimes one of the tells that you might expect from a scam or a fake website is that they're quite shallow - there isn't very much text or there aren't very many pictures.

"But this Halloween Nights Fear website is huge."

McClelland said scammers appeared to be getting "much more sophisticated".

"What I think has happened here is that the scammers are employing artificial intelligence to create these sophisticated, impressive looking websites," he said.

"When you look closely at some of the images on this website, there are some of the tell-tale signs that they are artificial intelligence-generated.

"But when you really start to peel away beneath the covers, it does start to fall apart, but you've really got to know what you're looking at.

"I would think that for the majority of people who come across this website, it shows everything that you would expect to see that tells you that it's real."

The BBC tried to contact Halloween Nights Fear but the phone number provided on the company's website was not recognised and it has yet to respond to an email approach.

Halloween Nights Fear is also not registered on Companies House and recently deleted its social media presence.

James Dymond, director at Bradgate Park, said he was aware of a number of people who had bought tickets to the fake Leicestershire event.

"It's a huge concern for all of the different venues," he said. "For us, we suffer no direct loss from this but what we recognise is that it's individuals buying tickets who are going to be put at risk of losing their money.

"All we can say to people is check with us, check our social media and our website first.

"If there is an event here that we are running or that we're sanctioning someone else to run, it will be there."

Leicestershire Trading Standards said initial checks on the website had identified "concerns", including a non-working telephone number, an address that does not appear genuine, and a recently registered domain.

"We are taking steps to contact the website operator and have requested that the site is deactivated," a spokesperson said.

"Anyone who has purchased tickets and believes they may have been affected should contact their bank as soon as possible to discuss potential recovery options.

"They can also seek advice from the Citizens Advice Consumer Service on 0808 223 1133, which shares information with Trading Standards."

In a post on social media, Cardiff Castle encouraged anyone who has bought tickets on the site to contact local trading standards services.

"We have been made aware of a website selling tickets for a 'Halloween scarefest' at Cardiff Castle," they said.

"This event is not linked to the castle and is not scheduled to take place here."

Listen to BBC Radio Leicester on Sounds and follow BBC Leicester on Facebook, on X, or on Instagram. Send your story ideas to eastmidsnews@bbc.co.uk or via WhatsApp on 0808 100 2210.