Diners angry after ballot scam targets Heston Blumenthal's The Fat Duck

Diners have expressed outrage after the balloting system at celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal's high-end restaurant ‘The Fat Duck’ was hacked by a group of scalpers.

Food lovers hoping to book a table at Heston Blumenthal's high-end restaurant 'The Fat Duck' are angry that scalpers managed to hack the balloting system and secure large numbers of reservations. 

The famous restaurant is relocating to The Crown in Melbourne for six months from February 2015 and an online balloting system was created for reservations in the face of high demand.

But it was this week revealed that a group of finance professionals scammed the system with the help of an Asia-based IT expert, making more than 100 reservations under false names.

The trio of finance professionals reportedly commissioned the IT expert to create a computer program to get around the restrictions on how many times they could apply, Good Food reports.

They are now giving the bookings away to their clients or selling them to colleagues and friends.

More than 250,000 applicants missed out on a reservation and many members of the public are now angry that the system was hacked.

Source SBS   Sylvia Varnham   November 18th 2014