Tokyo Police Detain 12 Over ¥30 Million Online-Game Currency Fraud

Tokyo Metropolitan Police on 1 July detained a total of 12 online-game users on suspicion of fraudulently obtaining in-game currency from titles run by SEGA Corp. and Square Enix Holdings Co. Investigators allege the suspects, aged from their 20s to 60s, hired so-called payment-proxy services that impersonated legitimate buyers and sent false settlement data to the game operators. The arrangement allegedly allowed the players to secure virtual currency worth about ¥30 million ($187,000) at a fraction of the normal cost, paying proxy agents fees of only 2%–6% of the official price. Four of the suspects were arrested while eight were referred to prosecutors for potential indictment, police said. Losses linked to similar schemes have climbed above ¥10 billion, including an estimated ¥1.3 billion hit to SEGA and ¥8.8 billion to Square Enix. Authorities warned that commissioning payment-proxy services can constitute a criminal offense and said they are continuing to investigate additional intermediaries involved in the racket.