Demand high, scammers out for Celine Dion concert comeback

PARIS (AP):

The management team at the Plenitude Arena, the Paris venue for Celine Dion ‘s grand concert comeback, is bracing to deliver devastating news to hundreds of her fans: ‘Sorry, you appear to have been scammed, your tickets are fake.’

The Grammy-winning star’s long-awaited return to the concert stage after years away from touring has unleashed massive pent-up demand for tickets. It’s a perfect storm for scammers who have wormed their way into fans’ online communities and set up fraudulent ticketing websites.

“Where there is massive demand and widespread excitement, fraudsters see a golden opportunity,” explained Group-IB, a Singapore-based cybersecurity firm that works with the international police agency Interpol and others.

The Plenitude Arena is hosting Dion for 16 dates in September and October and another 10 in May 2027. The first of the 26 shows is Saturday.

The highest risk of scams is when tickets first go on sale and in the shows’ immediate build-up.

“That’s when the public will be very exposed to these scammers,” Céline Trioux, the arena’s marketing director, said in an Associated Press interview.

“People are going to wake up and think, ‘Oh, right, I didn’t get a ticket, everyone is going ... I’m going to find a ticket by any means possible.’ And that’s also when the scammers will be out in force.”

The shows sold out immediately, although a few VIP packages ware still available for between 1,099 euros and 2,990 euros (US$1,276 and $3,473) on the arena’s website.

One other possibility is to buy tickets from people who no longer want theirs. But the only way to do that safely is on three sites that are authorised for resales: AXS France, Ticketmaster France and Fnac Spectacles, Trioux said.

Trioux said lawyers identified nearly 200 fraudulent Dion-related sites and social media accounts that offered tickets.

“[But] when we shut down one copycat website, another one opens. It’s a constant battle,” Trioux said. “It’s impossible to close them all, because technology is advancing faster than legal authorities can act.”

Trioux said that the arena is expecting possibly hundreds of fraud victims each night and will have a complaints desk, because these fans will generally discover the problem at the entrance, when they present their fake ticket.

“Staff will be there to receive them and explain the procedure to follow if they wish to file a police complaint,” Trioux explained.

The concert series is Celine Dion’s first since she revealed in 2022 her diagnosis with stiff-person syndrome, a rare neurological disorder. She last performed briefly at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Paris in 2024.