A crime ring accused of routinely running romance scams (dating fraud), crypto scams, and no-show scams based in Pattaya, Thailand, and stealing more than 20 billion won has been rounded up by police.
The Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency's Financial Crimes Investigation Unit said on the 22nd it arrested 25 members of the voice phishing ring "Lungeo Company" on charges including joining and operating a criminal organization and violating the Act on the Aggravated Punishment, etc. of Specific Economic Crimes (refunds for telecommunication fraud victims). Of them, 21 were detained.
According to police, the group name "Lungeo Company" combines the Chinese pronunciation of dragon, "lung," and the Chinese pronunciation of older brother, "geo," to mean "company of the dragon older brother." It was taken from the ringleader's stage name, "Jarong." Separate from the 25 arrested, nine people including Jarong, who is suspected to be the ringleader, are currently in Thai police custody and are being processed for extradition to Korea.
Members are suspected of defrauding 878 residents in Korea of 21 billion won from July last year to July this year. They subdivided into teams by scam type to carry out the crimes.
The romance scam team used photos obtained from social media (SNS) to approach victims and tricked them by saying that "if you complete a mission to deposit money on a specific site, you can receive airline tickets to travel together." The crypto scam team obtained customer data from a lottery recommendation site and collected money by saying they would refund the site's membership fee or, under the pretext of compensation for personal information leaks, by offering a chance to buy coins.
The no-show scam team impersonated military units and others to make bulk reservations and then induced proxy purchases by asking sellers to "prepare specific products," stealing the money. There was also an agency-impersonation team that posed as the prosecution or the Financial Supervisory Service and demanded money by saying "an account in your name was used for crime."
Investigators found that Head of Team-level managers strictly controlled members' daily lives. They restricted outings, overnight stays, and even the use of personal cellphones. Members who clashed with the ringleader were assaulted with weapons.
In June, Thai police raided a resort in Pattaya and arrested 20 members. They have been extradited to Korea since last month. Korean police also identified seven people, including the ringleader and a Head of Team, and notified Thai authorities, leading to the additional arrest of nine people.
Police plan to expand the investigation, believing there may be other groups and offices linked to Lungeo Company in Thailand. Police urged the public to be cautious about phishing scams, noting that everything online could be false.