South Korea Steps Up Online Gambling Crackdown

Posted 19 September 2006 @ 09:55 am EET     Print     Reprint     E-Mail     Comments

SEOUL (AP) - The government announced it is cracking down on South Koreans who have set up Internet gambling websites overseas to escape a domestic drive against betting. The Information and Communication Ministry said that in cooperation with portal operators, the government blocked domestic access to 53 overseas gambling sites in the first week of this month.

A total of 181 overseas gambling websites have now been blocked to South Koreans since the start of the year, it said, adding the move affected 60,000 local punters. The action is aimed at preventing operators of gambling websites from moving their servers overseas, the ministry said in a statement.

Prosecution authorities last month also launched a crackdown on video gambling arcades, which have mushroomed across the country by taking advantage of legal loopholes. President Roh Moo-Hyun has made a public apology for failing to prevent the spread of the arcades, whose operators are suspected of bribing government officials in return for licenses and favors.

South Korea boasts one of the world's highest Internet penetration rates, with one out of every four people having access to high-speed Internet. South Koreans on average spend 47.2 hours per month in cyberspace, the third highest following Israel and Finland, according to the ministry.