Macau authorities have broken up yet another illegal gambling operation livestreaming its activity via the WeChat social media platform.
On Monday, Macau’s Judiciary Police (PJ) announced the arrest of seven men – six from Macau, one from Hong Kong – after receiving a tip that an illegal online baccarat operation was being run out of a local apartment building.
The PJ later stated that the seven men had been recruited by a mainland China criminal syndicate and that the operation had been taking illegal online wagers for four months before the whip came down. The PJ has charged the seven with illegal gambling and belonging to a criminal organization, while continuing to pursue the operation’s ringleader.
Macau has disrupted an increasing number of illegal WeChat-based operations this year, including the June bust of a group streaming baccarat action from an unidentified Cotai casino VIP room.
WeChat has also been the subject of numerous prosecutions on the Chinese mainland, as a growing number of users began organizing informal ‘lottery pools’ using WeChat’s hongbao aka ‘red envelope’ virtual credits exchange system.
Tuesday also saw Macau police disrupt two loansharking rings that preyed on casino gamblers for at least six months. Following a tipoff, the PJ arrested 31 mainland residents, including the two suspected ringleaders. Rank-and-file members of the gangs reportedly earned commissions of MOP 2k (US $250) for every MOP 100k they lent out to unlucky gamblers.
While the PJ is still trying to determine if the loansharking operations were connected, the operations were reportedly based out of two units in the same residential tower. In July, the PJ arrested 15 members of a loansharking gang that was the subject of two previous police operations in March and June.
