Ticket Scalpers Who Exploited Baseball Fans Revealed to Be Ordinary Office Workers and Homemakers

[Anchor]

A large number of ticket scalpers who sold professional baseball game tickets at prices up to five times the original cost have been caught. Most of them turned out to be ordinary homemakers, office workers, and public servants.

Reporter Yoo Soo-Hwan has the story.

[Reporter]

At an internet cafe in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province.

A man sits in front of two computers displaying professional baseball game schedules and reservation pages.

Moments later, police raid the scene.

[We are executing a search warrant for violating the Information and Communications Network Act. Take your hands off.]

He is arrested on the spot for allegedly illegally reselling 300 professional baseball tickets.

The man, a 30-something office worker, confessed to the police that he had acted alone.

A total of 35 online scalpers who resold over 20,000 tickets from March of last year until recently have been apprehended by the police.

The majority were not part of criminal organizations, but rather ordinary office workers, public servants, and homemakers.

They told the police that they initially used macro programs to quickly book seats for themselves, but then realized they could make easy money.

They primarily used automated input programs known as macros and direct link programs.

[Kim Seong-taek / Chief of Cyber Crime Investigation Unit 1, Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency: When you usually access a site, it shows that thousands of people are waiting. (Direct links) are programs that pull up the seat selection screen immediately, as if cutting in line. It allows them to book faster than others.]

Tickets obtained in this way were resold at prices 1.5 to 5 times the original value. One office worker in his 30s earned 390 million won by selling 6,000 tickets over the course of one year.

The police stated that they are working with ticket reservation companies to develop defensive measures against the macro and direct link programs used for these online line-cutting schemes.

(Video Editing: Park Na-young, Footage courtesy of Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.