Nearly 1,000 tickets to Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour were allegedly stolen and resold for $635,000 in a sophisticated hacking scheme, according to New York prosecutors.
Two individuals, Tyrone Rose, 20, from Kingston, Jamaica, and Shamara Simmons, 31, from Queens, New York, were arrested and charged for orchestrating the cybercrime. The operation ran from June 2022 to July 2023, coinciding with the highly anticipated Eras Tour presales, which famously caused Ticketmaster’s system to crash.
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Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow's public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled.
— Ticketmaster (@Ticketmaster) November 17, 2022
Rose, a former employee of StubHub vendor Sutherland, allegedly hijacked ticket URLs and redirected them to Queens, where Simmons and a now-deceased accomplice downloaded and resold them on StubHub. The stolen tickets included Adele and Ed Sheeran concerts, NBA games, and U.S. Open tennis matches.
Queens County District Attorney Melinda Katz stated, “These defendants tried to use the popularity of Taylor Swift’s concert tour and other high-profile events to profit at the expense of others.”
Both suspects face charges of grand larceny, computer tampering, and conspiracy, carrying potential sentences of up to 15 years if convicted.
StubHub has since refunded all affected customers and reinforced security measures to prevent further breaches.
The Eras Tour made history as the highest-grossing tour ever, surpassing $2 billion in revenue before concluding on December 8, 2024, in Vancouver.
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