In recent months, there has been a concerning trend in China involving the illegal trafficking of personal information related to celebrities and internet influencers. Details such as flight bookings, high-speed rail tickets, hotel accommodations, and even specific travel itineraries are now being sold on the black market. A criminal organization has reportedly gained unauthorized access to travel data for over 3,000 artists and social media personalities, profiting approximately 2.2 million yuan through these illicit activities.
Reports confirm that this criminal group, led by an individual identified only as Lin, consists of members located across various regions of the country. These individuals have collaborated through remote divisions of labor to gather, organize, price, and ultimately sell this sensitive data.
The types of information compromised and sold include detailed travel plans, flight numbers, train schedules, timing of travel, hotel check-in records, and personal identifying information. The group categorizes prices based on the fame of the artist, the completeness of the data, and its timeliness. For an average artist or influencer’s travel data, the price is set at around 150 yuan, while complete itineraries for highly popular celebrities can exceed 200 yuan. Each transaction can vary significantly, with amounts ranging from hundreds to thousands of yuan.
An alarming incident occurred in late 2025 during the filming of a reality show in Leshan, Sichuan, where a large number of fans congregated outside the hotel where the production crew was staying, as well as at the filming locations. When the crew’s vehicles went out, some fans even rode electric bikes to block the cars, creating dangerous situations that disrupted filming and affected local residents. Investigations revealed that some of these fans had knowledge of the artists’ precise schedules, tracing back to the long-standing network that exploits and sells travel information.
Notably, this criminal operation does not rely solely on individual informants but has instead crafted a well-defined remote operation model. Some members manipulate loopholes in ticketing and travel platforms to obtain information, while others categorize, organize, and label this data. Additionally, certain individuals reach out to potential buyers via social media and fan groups.
Moreover, the gang has collaborated with insiders from relevant industries to acquire travel information that should not be publicly available. After gathering this data, they promote it through platforms such as Weibo, fan communities, short video comment sections, and private chat groups, ultimately guiding buyers toward clandestine transactions.
Some buyers not only use the information for personal purposes but also resell it at markup, creating a multilayered distribution network. The organization even offers so-called “box-opening tutorials,” teaching others how to search for and acquire personal data, thereby linking the theft, organization, sale, and education about accessing private information into a comprehensive illegal enterprise.
In July 2026, 38 suspects associated with the group led by Lin were apprehended, with 34 of them facing criminal penalties. The group amassed illegal profits amounting to 2.2 million yuan, and the case also involves over 70 interconnected criminal organizations and approximately 612 individuals linked to similar offenses.
In addition to exploiting platform vulnerabilities, personnel within the airline industry may also contribute to the leak of personal information. In another case, a woman surnamed Shu, employed by an outsourced customer service for an airline, garnered attention due to her enthusiasm for following celebrities. Her activities in fan groups led her to discover that there were individuals purchasing artists’ flight data. She then abused her work privileges to access information about artist ticket purchases.
Shu exploited the airline’s internal customer service system to retrieve flight data and identification numbers by entering passengers’ names. To bypass company regulations prohibiting the use of mobile devices for recording or videotaping, she transcribed the information onto paper and slipped it out of the company when her supervisor was distracted, handing it off to buyers.
Diving deeper, Shu illegally obtained and sold more than 100 sets of flight and identification information about various artists, earning 13,100 yuan in the process. She was subsequently sentenced to 10 months in prison, with a one-year probation for violating laws regarding personal information rights.
This instance highlights that leaks of artists’ travel data do not exclusively stem from vulnerabilities in online platforms. Individuals holding the authority to access passenger information can similarly exploit their position for personal gain.
The journey from fans purchasing artists’ travel information to data vendors collecting and categorizing it according to value levels, and further to airline staff providing tips, demonstrates how the demand for celebrity tracking has morphed into an organized criminal business. The selling of artists’ flights, hotel stays, and daily movements has commodified their personal information, exposing them to risks of harassment, stalking, and potential exploitation by other criminal elements.