Mobile phone gambling police report uncovered a shocking case

"Officer, I'm reporting this to a police officer. Please save me. I've lost so much money gambling on my phone that my family is about to fall apart!"

On July 28, 2021, Xiong from Shayang County, Hubei Province, reported the case to the Jishan Police Station. No one expected that a shocking cross-border online gambling case would reveal the tip of the iceberg.

Xiong likes to play with his mobile phone to kill time in his spare time. One day in June of that year, he saw his colleagues playing chess and card games on their mobile phones. They won thousands of yuan by recharging 100 yuan, which made him envious. Xiong immediately downloaded the software called "XXX chess and card game" and soon won a sum of money. After playing for a while, the stakes became bigger and bigger, but the probability of winning became smaller and smaller, and he eventually lost more than 100,000 yuan.

As the investigation into the case deepened, the police officers of Shayang County Public Security Bureau realized that this was by no means a seemingly simple case of online gambling using a mobile phone APP. The large number of people involved, the wide geographical area, the huge amount of funds, and the complexity of the money laundering methods were unprecedented for the police officers of the county-level public security agency.

"Preliminary investigations have revealed that the amount of money involved in this online gambling case is 400 billion yuan, with more than 50,000 people involved. The server is set up overseas, and the funds are laundered using the most difficult-to-detect virtual currency. The main suspects of the case may be overseas..."

After listening to the case report from the Shayang County Public Security Bureau, Jingmen City Deputy Mayor and Public Security Bureau Director Chen Shi immediately ordered the dispatch of elite police forces and the Shayang County Public Security Bureau's investigation team to form the "728" task force.

As the investigation into the case deepened, the case was successively identified by the relevant superior departments as a provincial and ministerial supervision case.

The difficulty of reconnaissance gave rise to classic tactics

The particularity of new cyber crimes has made traditional investigative techniques and tactics "ineffective."

"It's not easy, it's very difficult!" Ma Jun, the head of the "728" task force, was under great pressure. As the investigation of the case deepened, the investigators found it difficult to move forward in the face of this complex criminal network that was like a maze.

——Online gambling is disguised as chess and card games, and the servers are set up overseas to avoid crackdowns; there are tens of thousands of people involved in the gambling, making it difficult to investigate and collect evidence!

——The backbone of the criminal gang is commanding from abroad and has developed hundreds of offline agents in the country, making them difficult to identify and arrest!

——Online game bean recharge, traditional bank card batch circulation, fourth-party payment platform sedimentation, virtual currency laundering, gambling-related funds are disguised and circulated repeatedly, making it difficult to link and trace the source!

For a time, the investigation of the case encountered difficulties at every turn.

"We knew we were getting close to the key core and were about to find the main backbone of the suspect gang, but we always felt that there was a veil between us and we couldn't get past it." The police officers of the task force tracked the flow of personnel, information and funds day and night, but they got stuck when they reached the critical link.

"The world is bustling with people all because of profit, and the world is bustling with people all because of profit." This statement by Zheng Daiping, deputy county magistrate and public security bureau chief of Shayang County, made the police officers of the task force's eyes light up.

"In this case, whether it is the organizational framework of the suspect gang or the circulation network of fund transfer, they are all as densely interwoven as human blood vessels, but they must have intersections between capillaries and trunk veins, and eventually flow to the heart of the fund pool. Funds are the blood of this case. As long as we keep an eye on the blood, follow it, and investigate, we will definitely find the key to the case!"

The remarks made by Yan Yintao, a key investigator of the task force, opened the eyes of his comrades who had been staring at massive data analysis for months with little success. A groundbreaking classic tactic for combating new types of cybercrime - the "fund penetration method" was born!

Massive data collision to identify criminal paths

After determining the investigative approach of the "fund penetration method", the case detection was as efficient, accurate and unstoppable as if a GPS navigation system was installed.

Organizational charts of suspects were posted and linked on the case analysis whiteboard.

The flow charts of gambling-related funds are intersected and aggregated in the computer database.

The backbone members of the suspected gangs were located and visualized in the investigators' brains...

The police of the task force unraveled the massive transaction data and finally successfully locked down the capital chain and related suspects. Multiple gambling agents, recharge agents, and intermediary agent gangs hiding in various parts of the country gradually surfaced.

From December 2021 to April 2022, police officers of the task force rushed to Fujian, Sichuan, Guangxi, Henan and other places to carry out arrest operations, successively destroyed 14 related gangs, arrested more than 130 suspects, and seized more than 300 computers and mobile phones involved in the case, 200 mobile phone cards and bank cards involved in the case, and 18 money counting machines and POS machines.

During the interrogation, the police found that all transactions of the gamblers were settled with a virtual currency. The task force followed the clues and successfully locked up multiple virtual currency accounts involved in the case. The task force connected with the virtual currency issuing agency and froze the relevant virtual currency accounts involved in the case, preventing the virtual currency worth US$160 million (about RMB 1 billion) in the account from flowing into the hands of the suspect gang.

In October 2022, the People's Court of Shayang County made a judgment to confiscate part of the frozen virtual currency in accordance with the law. This case became the first "virtual currency first case" in the country to be confiscated by court judgment.

To catch a thief, we must catch the leader. Cross-border arrest of the main culprit

After nearly two years of hard investigation, this major online gambling case has finally been uncovered, but the three main culprits are still at large overseas. To "catch the thief", you need to "catch the king". The police of the special case team held back their energy and launched the final "sprint", and a battle of wits and courage overseas arrest quietly unfolded...

With the support and coordination of the Ministry of Public Security, the "728" case initiated transnational judicial cooperation, and the Hubei Provincial Public Security Department led five members of the task force to go abroad in pursuit.

"This was a tough battle. We overcame numerous difficulties and successfully responded to various unprecedented challenges." The police officers of the task force said that they carried out their work abroad in strict accordance with relevant laws and regulations and actively communicated and cooperated with foreign law enforcement agencies.

The arrest operation abroad received strong help and support from my country's foreign affairs agencies in the country. The tortuous and difficult 59-day cross-border law enforcement finally had a successful result. In December 2022, three main suspects hiding abroad were arrested and subsequently repatriated.

In June 2023, the principal offender Qiu and others were transferred to the Shayang County People's Court by the Shayang County People's Procuratorate in accordance with the law, and the case entered the court trial stage. So far, this "first virtual currency case" in the country has finally come to an end with the efforts of the task force.