Man in His 40s Sentenced to 4 Years in Prison for 8.5 Billion Won Credit Card Fraud Using Acquaintances' Cards

A man in his 40s has been sentenced to four years in prison for orchestrating an 8.5 billion won fraud scheme using the credit card information of 17 acquaintances, leaving the victims with hundreds of millions of won in unpaid debt.
The Busan District Court's 6th Criminal Division (Presiding Judge Lim Seong-cheol) announced on July 7 that it had sentenced the man, identified as A, to four years in prison on charges of violating the Act on the Aggravated Punishment, etc. of Specific Economic Crimes.
According to the verdict, from March 2023 to April 2025, A deceived his victims by claiming, "I need to acquire golf clubs to sell to professionals, but I cannot get a credit card because I am a credit delinquent." He promised them, "I will pay off the credit card installments every month after purchasing the golf clubs."
It was revealed that A used the credit cards of 17 acquaintances to make a total of 1,206 transactions, amounting to over 5.1 billion won, through a method known as card kkang (illegal credit card cash-out).
He also deceived payment processing agencies by pretending that actual transactions had taken place, illicitly obtaining approximately 4.97 billion won through 1,184 transactions.
When combined with additional loan fraud, where he borrowed money from acquaintances under the pretext of paying deposits or purchasing real estate and failed to repay it, the total scale of the fraud reached approximately 8.57 billion won.
It was confirmed that A continued his criminal activities by using a "robbing Peter to pay Paul" scheme with the victims' money.
As A failed to pay the credit card bills on time, the actual financial damage incurred by the victims reached approximately 900 million won.
The court stated, "There are numerous victims of the fraud, and despite the large amount of money involved, the defendant has not reached a settlement with the victims." The court added, "By repeatedly using the credit card information of others obtained through deception or other dishonest means, he has significantly undermined social trust in credit transactions."
(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.