Mobile apps facilitate remote play
The government of Macau has warned casino and junket operators in the city to abide by a 2016 rule banning the use of a mobile messaging app to link outside punters to live casino games. According to GGRAsia, proxy betting was discovered inside a Macau casino for the second time in a row this year.
Earlier this month Macau’s Judiciary Police arrested 17 men for alleged “real time” filming of VIP baccarat games in a casino on the Cotai Strip. They then allegedly broadcast them via WeChat to a network of gamblers outside the casino.
A news release from Macau’s Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau said the regulator “has demanded of gaming concessionaires and promoters that, besides strictly complying with the casino tableside phone ban measure, they step up inspection efforts regarding the use of telecommunication equipment in other casino areas. Anyone suspected of wrongdoing should be immediately reported to the authorities.”
The ban took effect last May when the DICJ determined that proxy betting represented a gaping loophole in “Know Your Customer” standard, which is considered essential to combating money laundering.
From May 2016 through April 2017, law enforcement issued a total of 71 verbal warnings about proxy bets. Seven Mainland Chinese men were arrested in April for allegedly partaking in illegally betting US$1.3 million for gamblers from China. Judiciary Police spokesperson Choi Ian Fai said the suspects “gathered gamblers from Mainland China via the use of the mobile phone application WeChat, their selling point being that the gamblers could play real baccarat games in Macau.”
According to Choi, “When one person was gambling at the table, accomplices sitting behind them would follow the instructions from their ringleaders or other accomplices outside the casino and tell them how much should be placed on ‘banker’ and ‘player’ bets. The gang took photographs and filmed live video of the games and broadcast it to the gamblers in the WeChat groups via mobile phone.”
