South Korea probes 17 scalpers over $13.8m hidden income
South Korean tax authorities launched investigations on Thursday, November 6, into 17 ticket scalpers accused of hiding approximately 20 billion won, or $13.8 million, in secondary market earnings. The National Tax Service disclosed that 400 entities comprising the top one percent of sellers on major ticketing platforms control nearly half of all resale transactions, with targeted investigation subjects including private school instructors, public institution workers, and organized operations whose average annual transaction volumes reach 67 million won per person.
Investigators identified scalpers who secured over 40,000 tickets across multiple years through automated software and fake accounts, marking up prices as much as 30 times face value while concealing income through deleted sales posts and borrowed-name accounts. One proxy ticketing service called EEE charged 100,000 won success fees per transaction and obtained about 1,200 tickets over six months using macro programs and more than 10 user accounts, with its operator allegedly accumulating 1.2 billion won in stocks from unreported revenue.
