https://biz.chosun.com/en/en-society/2025/01/20/EDAK2P5ORVE2JHFDNGPGE5A5JU/

A former professional football player has been caught by police for leading an illegal gambling site money laundering organization valued at over 1 trillion won. This former professional football player was punished for match-fixing charges.

The Busan Police Agency's Cyber Crime Investigation Unit announced on the 20th that they had arrested eight individuals, including former professional football player Mr. A, on charges of violating the National Sports Promotion Act and establishing gambling sites, and had booked an additional eleven individuals. Mr. A, a former professional football player, is a figure who was punished and permanently banned for his involvement as a broker in the past K League match-fixing incident. He played a key role in planning and managing the crime during this case.

Mr. A and others are suspected of having established fake coin trading sites in the country from January 2022 to September of last year and laundering 1.1 trillion won in gambling funds received from 66,802 members of 112 illegal gambling sites. To launder the illegal gambling funds, they purchased over 200 fake bank accounts and phones from operators of fake accounts and used them to issue thousands of virtual accounts for transferring gambling funds.

They also employed a method where the illegal gambling site linked the deposit sites for gambling funds to fake coin trading sites for members. As a result, when illegal gamblers or the holders of fake bank accounts were summoned by investigative authorities, they managed to evade investigations by presenting transaction records as if they had engaged in legitimate coin trading, as revealed by police investigations.

Police reported that they had seized illegal gains worth over 10 billion won, which is 1% of the laundered gambling funds, and used these funds for living expenses, entertainment expenses, and financing other illegal gambling sites.

Police are currently searching for evidence at their bases, seizing servers, and identifying those who transferred funds related to money laundering. They have reported the remaining crime proceeds of 730 million won to the National Tax Service for tax evasion, while also requesting that the Korea Communications Standards Commission block 112 illegal gambling sites associated with them.

In particular, police handed over 80 teenagers who sent funds to operate illegal gambling to the Youth Leading Review Committee. The teenagers joined the illegal gambling site after watching deepfake promotional videos featuring celebrities' faces. Lee Kyung-min, head of the Cyber Crime Investigation Unit of the Busan Police Agency, noted, “We plan to further apprehend accomplices, trace crime proceeds, and investigate high-stakes gamblers.”