UPDATE (25 Aug, 11.50pm): Scoot has said that “human error” resulted in an email being sent to a distribution list containing customers who have previously travelled with Scoot, or have future bookings with it. The email was meant only for passengers on TR100.
This was not a data security or hacking incident, the airline assured those affected, and no 3rd party was sent an email with their personal information. Scoot sincerely apoplogised, and added that it will do an internal review. It has already reported the matter to the Personal Data Protection Commission and contacted all the affected customers.
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Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, most of us can’t travel and haven’t had any plans to travel for the entire year.
However, when Scoot sends an email to you, apparently indicating that you’re booked on a flight to China, it may come as a shock.
That’s what a whole group of people in Singapore probably felt when they got an email like this:
Many Singaporeans seemed to have received not one, but multiple copies of such emails from “The Scoot Team”, adding to the confusion.
However, the booking references were all different.
What was probably the most unnerving, though, was that the emails addressed their recipients by name, suggesting that whoever or whatever sent the emails had their personal data.
Quite a lot of people received the emails, judging from the more than 300 comments on Scoot’s Facebook post on Monday (24 Aug), which was about their modified plane for cargo freight.
Many of the comments were worried that it could be a scam or Scoot’s system could have been hack, considering many previous reports of scams and the websites of organisations being hacked.
Some even thanked Scoot for the “free flight” in jest, but they had to decline as they don’t think they may make it back to Singapore.
One asked Scoot whether their emails were leaked, while another pointed out that everyone who got the emails were on the same flight — TR100 from Singapore to Guangzhou, departing on 30 Aug at 5.15am.
One commenter noticed that the booking reference numbers are that of his past bookings with the airline.
Scoot has issued a clarification on the matter, and it seems like it’s an error on their part.
In a statement sent to MS News from Scoot media relations, it said that the email was meant for passengers booked on flight TR100.
However, it was “mistakenly sent” to other customers who were not on the flight.
Scoot assured the public that it found no data breach or leak of personal data from this incident.
It also apologised for the “oversight”.
The airline is investigating the matter, and is prioritising what happened so it can rectify the error, it added.
An update on what has been found will be given in due course.
While it’s concerning to receive an email for a flight that you didn’t book, admit it, some of you were slightly titillated at the idea of being able to travel again.
However, in this age of digital scams and identity theft, most were probably concerned that your data was accessed and stolen by criminals.
Now that Scoot has clarified that it’s a mistake, let’s hope that it will be rectified and our data is safe.
Featured images adapted from Scoot and Facebook.
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