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By Nam Hyun-woo
After a recent match-fixing case involving a professional basketball coach, illegal sports betting has come back onto the public's radar.
Data show astonishing facts.
The National Gambling Control Commission revealed in a study the amount of illegal sports betting, which includes unauthorized betting on horseracing, cycling, motorboat racing and online betting on other sports, was estimated to have reached some 17.5 trillion won in 2012. The total amount of illegal gambling was estimated at 75 trillion won.
In a separate study conducted by the Korean Institute of Criminology (KIC), the amount of illegal sports betting jumped to some 31 trillion won in 2013, while the institute estimate the total size of illegal gambling hovers around 100 trillion won.
Experts agree illegal sports gambling is flourishing.
According to the National Assembly Education, Culture, Sports and Tourism committee, the number of illegal sports gambling cases reported to police jumped to 46,527 in 2013 from 7,951 in 2011, indicating a whopping six-fold growth. The committee added that more than 30,000 cases were reported to police in the first half of 2015.
Kang Seok-ku of the KIC said bolstering the competitiveness of the lawful gambling industry is a way to address the ever-growing illegal sports gambling.
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