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The American Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit against the reseller company Key Investment Group on Monday, August 18. It is said to have applied illegal tactics to avoid the purchase restrictions on major events and to resell the tickets at significantly higher prices.
Illegal ticket sales?
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) claims that the leading company of the secondary ticket market has violated the Better Online Ticket Sales (Bots) Act. The Key Investment Group has acquired hundreds of thousands of tickets for Taylor Swift’s “The Eras Tour” and other large concerts and resold them with a profit of several million dollars.
According to the FTC studies, thousands of fake ticket master accounts were used to use hundreds of virtual and real credit cards and veiled IP addresses to bypass the security mechanisms on the primary market by Ticketmaster and Co. “From March 24, 2023 to August 20, 2023, the accused bought ten or more tickets for each of the 38 concerts by Taylor Swift,” says an official FTC statement.
“To name just one example of a single Taylor swift concert: The accused used 49 different accounts to buy 273 tickets for the Taylor Swift concert on March 25, 2023 in the Allegiant stage in Las Vegas”, so the ticket purchase restrictions from Tiefetmaster were exceeded-the maximum number of tickets is finally Tickets per account. According to FTC, the company used a total of 277 different accounts for a bruce jumping room in the Metlife stage in 2023 to secure over 1,500 tickets with which it had achieved total sales of $ 21,000 (18,000 euros).
Key Investment Group defends itself
A representative of the reseller company accused the FTC regulative abuse. They warned of the effects of the lawsuit on the secondary ticket market. According to “PR Newswire”, it also says in a statement: “According to the interpretation of the FTC, anyone who buys more than four tickets or uses more than one account could be seen as a violation of federal law. This result is not only illogical, but absurd”. The Key Investment Group assured that they “vigorously defend itself against this unique example of regulatory abuse”.
FTC chairman Andrew N. Ferguson, on the other hand, said according to the “Consquence” that the lawsuit send a clear message: Creacher who systematically avoid buying buying would have to expect consequences. The lawsuit is part of a larger government initiative to regulate the ticket secondary market more and to ensure fair access for fans.