*This content was translated by AI.
A 30-year-old man who purchased large quantities of tickets for numerous popular K-pop idol concerts and resold them at prices up to 30 times higher, pocketing tens of billions of won, has been arrested by police.
According to NEWS1, the Cyber Crime Investigation Division 2 of the Gyeonggi Northern National Police Agency announced on the 16th that they have detained and transferred a 30-year-old man, identified as A, on charges including obstruction of business.
Police investigation revealed that from September 2018 to April this year, over a period of seven years and seven months, A purchased 8,967 tickets for popular performances using macro programs and other people’s accounts, then resold them for approximately 2.4 billion won.
A committed crimes such as purchasing tickets for famous idol concerts, overseas singer visit concerts, popular trot singer concerts, musicals, sports events, etc., and reselling them at prices up to 30 times higher. The purchased tickets were stored across seven online accounts belonging to himself, family members, and relatives. He later resold them by handing over entry wristbands at concert venues or changing the delivery address of the tickets to the buyer’s address.
A also participated as a member in a now-defunct domestic largest-scale scalping transaction SNS group chat room, sharing scalping information and recruiting accomplices. Furthermore, to disguise his scalping sales as legitimate business, he even registered as a business operator under the e-commerce industry category and continued his criminal activities.
However, after A learned from media reports that police had arrested a large-scale scalping cartel group, he suddenly stopped his criminal activities in April, fearing he would also be caught. He then formatted his PC and hard drive to destroy evidence and even asked an artificial intelligence (AI) about police investigations related to scalping.
During their investigation of the scalping transaction SNS group chat room, police had already begun investigating A, seized relevant evidence such as USB drives from A’s residence, and secured numerous materials through forensics to prove the crime.
A denied the charges, stating, “I did not know that scalping transactions were illegal, and I paid taxes diligently.” The court found sufficient grounds for the charges and issued an arrest warrant.
Police believe A kept about two-thirds of the 2.4 billion won in scalping sales as profit and used these criminal proceeds to purchase one apartment and two commercial buildings. However, at the time of his arrest, the apartment had already been sold.
Police have identified a total of 1.264391199 billion won worth of assets under A’s name, including two commercial buildings and bank deposits, as criminal proceeds and implemented pre-prosecution asset preservation measures to recover them.
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*This content was translated by AI.