By Lee Hyo-sik
Sports fans, dismayed by snowballing reports of match fixing in professional leagues, are throwing their weight behind the growing call for a crackdown on mushrooming illegal gambling sites.
Government officials say these sites where gamblers can bet unlimited amounts of money on sports matches are one of the key factors fostering the match fixing encompassing football, volleyball, basketball and baseball.
The fair-play spirit has become a thing of the past as many players have became willing to manipulate match outcomes to rake in illegal gains through illicit sports betting in collusion with middlemen.
However, it is not easy to crack down on the unlawful websites as they frequently change their addresses.
“Some of them even operate abroad by setting up servers outside Korea to evade police crackdowns,” an officer said.
The illegal gambling market was valued at an estimated 3 trillion won in 2010, according to police.
The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, which oversees professional sports leagues and manages Sports Toto, admitted that it is difficult to uncover and close all illegal gambling sites.
“It is true that we are facing difficulty in clamping down on illicit sports gambling operators in cyberspace. But we will work harder to come up with effective measures to shut down the sites and prevent professional athletes from taking part in match-fixing scams,” a ministry official said.
Currently, Sports Toto is the only authorized sports betting agency in the country. It issues odds on professional sports games, only allowing people to bet on wins, ties, losses and the combined scores between the teams. The maximum wager is 100,000 won ($89) on each game.
Illegal sports gambling sites offer a much wider range of ways to place a bet. For instance, in baseball they place odds on minute and inconsequential plays, such as the number of first-inning walks yielded by a starting pitcher.
Additionally, these sites set no limits on the wager amount, allowing gamblers to bet as much money as they want to.
They also provide larger gains to those who win bets, compared to Sports Toto, as they do not have to set aside part of the earnings for other purposes. The legitimate operator is required to spend 27 percent of its earnings to upgrade stadiums and other sports infrastructure, meaning it pays smaller prize money to winners.
But attracted by diverse ways to bet, unlimited betting and larger prize money, tens of thousands of salaried workers and university students, among others, have flocked to illegal sites in cyberspace.
According to the Korea Institute of Criminology, about 1,000 illicit sports gambling sites were in operation as of June last year.
The institute said there are now many more such sites, generating larger earnings by capitalizing on the ongoing economic slump. When the economy is bad, people tend to gamble more in an attempt to make quick and easy money.
Against this backdrop, the government has attempted to clamp down on illicit sports betting sites but failed to do so as they frequently change their net addresses. After the change, they notify site members of new sites through a text message or via Twitter and other social networking service tools.
A match-rigging scandal involving professional sports surfaced in May 2011 when a group of football players colluded with brokers to realize illegal gains by fixing matches.
It came to the public attention again early this month when two retired and one active volleyball player from KEPCO 45 and another one from the military team Sangmu Shinhyup were arrested on charges of taking money for manipulating match outcomes.
The probe has expanded to include professional baseball and basketball leagues after an arrested gambling middleman said players of these were also involved in rigging game results.