Visitors to Riverside’s Festival of Lights warned of parking scam

With visitors flocking to Riverside for the annual Festival of Lights, city officials are warning people to be on the lookout for fake QR codes posted by scammers at parking pay stations.

The fraudulent QR codes direct people to websites that ask for credit card or debit card information in an apparent effort to steal financial data.

“Scammers were putting different QR code details over existing ones that would direct them to a similar looking site” to the city parking portal, said Ryan Railsback, public information officer for the police department.

The city has attempted to find and remove fake QR codes, “but we want the public to be aware,” Railsback said. He recommended going directly to the city’s parking website https://parkatriverside.com/ instead of scanning the city’s QR code be safe.

For decades, attending the Festival of Lights based at the Mission Inn Hotel & Spa has been a holiday ritual for many locals and out-of-town visitors, drawing hundreds of thousands of annual viewers.