There's no way that threatening someone to leave them stranded in a foreign country is the result of "miscommunication". This behaviour on Samsung's part is simply despicable.
Even if the bloggers had agreed to work for Samsung, and then changed their mind, holding return tickets ransom would not have been an acceptable course of action.
There is no way that this is explained by stupidity, this is malice in its purest form.
Mmmm, how about stupidity followed by malice? Pure malice doesn't make sense. What's so valuable about using foreign bloggers to stand around with phones instead locals?
I'd say Negitivefrags's guess is good. Something like that might have happened, and then when the bloggers didn't co-operate with the misinformed boss, the nasty stuff started.
Even if the bloggers had agreed to work for Samsung, and then changed their mind, holding return tickets ransom would not have been an acceptable course of action.
There is no way that this is explained by stupidity, this is malice in its purest form.