K-Pop Concert Scammer Gets Sent To Prison

A Korean man was sentenced to prison on January 16, KST, for swindling ₩595 million KRW (about $444,000 USD) from selling fake K-Pop concert tickets.

Image used for illustrative purposes only | NoCut News

The 30-year-old perpetrator, identified by his surname Kim, was found guilty on multiple counts of fraud by the Seoul Central District Court. According to the investigation, Kim had pretended to sell concert tickets of popular artists like IU, BLACKPINK, and Lim Young Woong approximately 130 times. He pocketed the profits from these sales and refused to send the tickets to the buyers.

BLACKPINK | NME Lim Young Woong | Yonhap

In October 2022, Kim sold a BLACKPINK concert ticket for ₩650,000 KRW (about $485 USD), and the following month, he sold a Lim Young Woong concert ticket for ₩450,000 KRW (about $336 USD). Kim also used the credit card information of the buyers he acquired while selling them tickets to IU’s concert to get bank loans.

IU | EDAM Entertainment

Additionally, Kim is also accused of running other scams involving musical tickets, cameras, gift certificates for local department stores, and video game currency. According to reports, he has cheated 31 victims so far, acquiring ₩595 million KRW (about $444,000 USD) in the process.

The defendant continued to go on scamming his victims even while he was being tried for fraud, and used the profits for gambling and making cryptocurrency investments. (The court) has decided that he should receive a punishment on par with (the severity of) his crime.

— Seoul Central District Court

Kim has appealed the ruling.

Seoul District Court | Wikimedia Commons

The South Korean music industry is currently dealing with rampant cases of scalping, where fans pay a premium price to see popular artists. According to a recent survey by the Record Label Industry Association of Korea, 32.8% of fans aged between 19 and 29 have bought tickets from scalpers at least once, and 20% of them admitted to spending more than ₩500,000 KRW (about $373 USD) on a single ticket.

One of the singers whose name was used in Kim’s scamming, Lim Young Woong, canceled 118 ticket reservations for his January 19-21 concert, which were suspected of having been bought by scalpers. The priciest tickets for this concert were sold at ₩160,000 KRW (about $119 USD), which was re-sold by scalpers for as much as ₩1.00 million KRW (about $747 USD).