Online casino gaming is an activity that millions of people enjoy on a daily basis. From casino games to poker, bingo and the lottery, there are several ways to enjoy online gaming. However, depending on where you live, you may be limited to your gambling access online or not have access at all. In the United States, online gambling is restricted to three states currently while in the United Kingdom, you can access hundreds of online gambling sites.
While most areas have some form of regulation in regards to online casino gaming, there are still operators who provide services without licensing or in areas that are not regulated. This is of course against the law and sometimes such operators are caught and arrested, with operations shut down. The Guangdong police force recently made a whopping 218 arrests for involvement in an online casino gaming operation that was illegally taking place.
The illegal option was quite large, considering the amount of people arrested in connection. The operation even went so far as to use names of major gambling operators in Macau to try and garner attention of players and create a big customer base. According to police, this has been the largest online scam to take place in the gambling genre in some time.
Players were reportedly lured to the online casino with messages sent to the player’s mobile telephones. As much as $21 million was scammed from more than 1,000 victims based in several cities across China. Police were first notified about the operators in March of last year. Two online gambling sites that were operating illegally were discovered soon after the alert. Such casinos as the Galaxy, Venetian Macao and the Grand Lisboa were used to try to lure players to the illegal sites.
Complaints first began in Foshan and Guangdong police found that the websites were offering gaming products with activities like live dealer gaming with footage sent via video stream. Players were asked to make a deposit into a particular account to be able to purchase gaming chips and then play. The sites were only offered in Chinese meant to target players located in mainland China.
The investigation found that the online casino sites were being hosted in Poipet, with servers found in the Cambodian city. On the 1st of March, raids took place in Poipet and the 281 individuals were arrested. These individuals were flown back to the mainland on the 12th of the month. Yesterday, the media reported that 38 of the individuals who were arrested were already wanted in China in connection with other crimes. These individuals had provided illegal online gambling services and transferred funds that were fraudulently obtained during casino gaming operations illegally in the area.
The crackdown into the illegal online gambling scheme involved over 1,000 police officers with arrests taking place across 18 different provinces. It was believed that the main suspects who were arrested were based in Fujian province and were found in Guangdong and Poipet.
This is not the first time nor will it be the last we see of illegal gambling operations in China. It is not uncommon to see illegal activity in the online genre as well as land based casino gambling. Criminals will take advantage of gamblers anyway they can from setting up illegal gambling sites to offering gambling dens for players to enjoy as much casino gaming as they want.
It was the massive scale of this operation that has everyone talking. With more than 1,000 officers working the case and over 200 people arrested, this case will definitely be one for the record books.
