San Francisco, CA: September 17, 2026 – Phocuswright projected online gross travel bookings to grow 8% in 2025 to about USD 1.07 trillion, and Statista estimates that online channels account for more than 70% of global travel and tourism revenue. Booking a trip online is now the default for most travellers.
Fraudsters have adapted. Cloned hotel and airline websites, fake price-comparison pages and social ads for deep discounts appear in the weeks before peak travel. In the UK, Action Fraud data cited by MoneySavingExpert showed just over GBP 11 million lost to holiday booking scams in 2024, with July the busiest month for reports. In the US, secondary reports citing consumer complaint data counted more than 64,000 travel-related fraud reports in 2025.
Because travellers often pay in advance and discover the problem only on arrival, victims frequently contact the real hotel or airline for help, and the brand pays the reputational cost.
“A traveller who finds no reservation at the front desk will remember the name on the building, not the name on the fake website. Travel brands need to see these sites before their guests do,” says Hannah Fletcher, marketing and events manager at MarkScout.
MarkScout monitors look-alike domains, search and social ads, and booking-platform listings for travel and hospitality clients, and removes fake pages that use the brand.