A criminal case involving illegal online casinos operating through digital platforms has been sent to court in Astana, with several individuals named as defendants, the website infohub.kz reports.
According to the Agency for Financial Monitoring, which announced the move on its Telegram channel, a group of individuals suspected of running illegal online casinos will stand trial. Case materials indicate the illegal activity may have been conducted through the websites Nomadgames, Sultangames and their mirror sites.
"A multi-tiered infrastructure was used to accept players' money, including payment organizations, bank acquiring, POS and internet terminals, e-wallets and cryptocurrency instruments. Representatives of the banking sector took part in the scheme, providing connections to the payment infrastructure, concluding contracts without the required checks and assigning the relevant MCC codes to internet terminals. To conceal the actual purpose of the transactions, they were carried out under the guise of legitimate bookmaking and other business activity," the agency said.
According to the Agency for Financial Monitoring, transactions worth more than 188 billion tenge were processed through the electronic terminals as a result. A controlled limited liability partnership is believed to have been used to launder criminal proceeds — 10 billion tenge was received into its accounts under a fictitious contract.
"The funds were subsequently converted into cryptocurrency and sent to the suspects' cryptocurrency wallets. The investigation established the movement of digital assets totaling 19 million USDT," the AFM added.
With court authorization, three apartments, six cars, as well as crypto assets and funds in bank accounts worth 1.4 billion tenge have been seized. Three suspects have been placed in custody as a preventive measure, another three were released on bail, and two are under a written undertaking not to leave and to behave properly.