The Financial Supervisory Service said on the 6th that, in cooperation with the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, it arrested and referred 54 members of a group involved in an online stock-tipping chatroom scam based in Cambodia. The damages total 19 billion won, marking the first case in which the Financial Supervisory Service worked with police to apprehend a stock-tipping chatroom ring with an overseas base.
The Financial Supervisory Service received a tip in May last year from an insider that about 500 members, including Chinese and Korean nationals, were stationed in Cambodia preparing an online stock-tipping chatroom scam impersonating well-known overseas financial companies.
The Chinese ringleader drafted the crime scenario, and Korean members operated as a translation team that translated and edited it into Korean, a counseling team that lured victims, and recruiters for burner accounts and members, dividing roles. They impersonated a well-known financial company in the United Kingdom and lured victims into online stock-tipping chatrooms. After providing greetings or continuous market updates to victims, they induced them to install a fake investment application and stole money under the guise of investment funds and other pretexts.
The Financial Supervisory Service secured Telegram accounts used in the crime and monitored chatrooms while collecting evidence. The Financial Supervisory Service passed identity information to police, and police identified key suspects through combined analysis with investigative materials such as criminal records. Separately, the Financial Supervisory Service opened a KakaoTalk open chatroom to collect additional victim information and provided it to police along with evidence.
Based on this, the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency arrested 54 members involved in multiple fraud offenses (18 detained, 36 booked without detention) and referred them to prosecutors on charges including organizing a criminal group.