Alaska Airlines miles stolen: What to do if your account is hacked
SEATTLE - If you haven’t checked your airline miles in a while, now might be the time.
Several Alaska Airlines customers are sounding the alarm after discovering their frequent flyer accounts were hacked, and their miles stolen.
Keep reading to learn how to protect your flight miles and what to do if they are stolen.
‘All my flights were canceled’
What we know:
Julie Horgan said she first realized something was wrong when her inbox filled with cancelation emails from Alaska Airlines.
"I started to panic a little bit, because I was like, no way, what are the odds?" Horgan said in an interview with FOX 13 Seattle.
But it wasn’t just her travel plans that were disrupted.
"I thought it was just my flights being canceled — and [the agent] was like, yeah, your miles are all gone."
According to Horgan, someone gained access to her account, canceled her booked flights, then used her accumulated miles — likely reselling them to someone else on a third party site.
Featured
Here's why Alaska Airlines requested a ground stop in Seattle
The airline expects it to take some time for overall operations to return to normal.
Not an isolated case
Dig deeper:
The issue doesn’t appear to be unique.
Multiple Reddit users posted this week about similar experiences — reporting hacked Alaska Airlines accounts and stolen miles.
One user wrote, "This happened to me. I didn’t even know until I went to book my next trip and saw all my points were gone."
Another echoed the same frustration: canceled trips, drained accounts and hours trying to resolve the issue.
"It’s violating for sure," Horgan said. "It makes you mad."
Alaska Airlines did not respond
FOX 13 Seattle reached out to Alaska Airlines by phone and email multiple times for comment about the reports of stolen miles. As of Wednesday, the airline has not responded.
Horgan said she was eventually able to recover her stolen miles — but only after spending hours on the phone with customer service and creating a PIN to protect her account.
‘I wish I had known sooner’
Local perspective:
Now, Horgan is sharing her story as a warning to other frequent flyers.
"People need to know this so they can protect themselves and protect their miles," she said. "I wish I would’ve known. I wish I could’ve been proactive — change my PIN, change my email … just be more aware of this stuff."
Hundreds of flights cancelled after Alaska Airlines ground stop
More than 400 flights were delayed or canceled at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (Sea-Tac) today following a system-wide ground stop caused by an IT outage at Alaska Airlines.
What to do if your miles are stolen
What you can do:
If you suspect your airline miles have been stolen:
- Check your account activity immediately and verify all flight bookings.
- Contact Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan support or the equivalent department with your airline.
- Change your login credentials, including email and password.
- Enable two-factor authentication if available.
While Alaska Airlines has yet to publicly address these specific incidents, experts recommend treating loyalty program miles like any other financial asset — with regular monitoring and strong password protection.
The Source: Information in this story came from Alaska Airlines customers and FOX 13 Seattle original reporting.
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