Interpol: Over 5,100 arrests for illegal gambling

The International Criminal Police Organisation, better known as Interpol, struck a major blow against illegal gambling around a fortnight ago. More than 5,100 people are said to have been arrested in the course of the extensive investigations. Betting fraud was at the centre of the investigation. But how did Interpol track down the suspects?

In April last year, we at GambleJoe reported on the major raid at tipster. At the time, the charges included illegal gambling, tax evasion, illegal employment and the formation of a criminal organisation. However, ‘only’ six people were arrested during the raid. The international police authority Interpol has now been able to make a total of 5,100 arrests as a result of extensive investigations. The ‘SOGA X’ operation involved forces from a total of 28 countries.

The reason for the operation was the European Football Championship in Germany

The aim of the secret operation ‘SOGA X’ was to uncover and prevent any kind of match-fixing. Most of the measures were already implemented in the summer of this year. At that time, the European Football Championship was taking place in Germany. At the time, we reported that up to one billion euros in bets were forecast in Germany during the European Football Championship.

The tournament was therefore a unique opportunity for organised crime to generate high revenues within a few weeks. For this reason, Interpol has focussed on combating illegal gambling in the sports betting sector and the associated betting fraud. There are also other criminal offences such as human trafficking, corruption and money laundering, which often go hand in hand with illegal gambling.

5,100 arrests and large sums of cash seized

Among other things, 5,100 people were provisionally arrested as part of the measures carried out. In addition, Interpol seized a total of more than 59 million US dollars during the investigations.

In the Philippines alone, according to the authorities, Interpol's measures enabled almost 650 people to be freed from forced labour for criminal organisations. In addition, thanks to Interpol, a gambling ring in Vietnam was broken up, which is said to have turned over around 800,000 US dollars a day.

Interpol also struck in Europe: for example, an illegal betting ring was broken up in Greece. Here, the suspects are said to have controlled several thousand fake player accounts on legal betting sites in order to misuse them for their own purposes.

Image source: https://pixabay.com/de/photos/polizei-polizist-notfall-symbol-4566193/