CHIANG MAI – Police arrested three Chinese nationals at a luxury rental home in Chiang Mai’s San Sai district after receiving reports of suspicious activity. Officers found the group running an online gambling website with reported monthly transactions exceeding 10 million baht.
All three entered Thailand using student visas but had not attended any university classes, choosing instead to stay inside the house almost all the time. Residents noticed the unusual behaviour and tipped off the authorities.
On June 16, the Region 5 Police Commander led a task force to search a residence in San Sai Noi. They found three Chinese men, aged between 29 and 30, living there. Officers seized seven mobile phones, four laptops and one tablet.
The group admitted they had lived at the property for over a year, entering Thailand with student visas after applying to two universities in Chiang Mai. However, they never attended classes. The Chinese boss, who remains in China, arranged all their paperwork and sent their monthly salary of 50,000 baht each.
Police began monitoring the house after neighbours reported that the men rarely left, except to receive food deliveries three times a day. The house always appeared closed up, and electricity bills reached nearly 10,000 baht a month.
Police from the cybercrime, tourist and immigration divisions coordinated the search and found evidence of online gambling activity. The website operated under a Chinese name, “GO 1818“. Officers charged the men with running an illegal online gambling business.
A translator helped police interview the suspects, who said they were from Zhejiang, China. They first arrived in Thailand on tourist visas, then switched to student visas by enrolling at two local universities.
They rented the house for 22,000 baht per month starting in September 2024. Their job was to act as administrators for the gambling site, which served customers in China.
Their manager, based in China, sends their salary. Every six months, he returns to China to collect payment before coming back to Thailand. The operation had been running for over a year, with more than 10 million baht moving through their accounts each month.
Checks on their passports confirmed none of the men had attended any classes at the institutions they claimed to be studying at.
The Region 5 Police Commander noted that more groups are using student visas as cover to set up online gambling operations in Thailand.
He urged universities to review their visa policies for international students, especially those from China, to prevent their programs from being exploited. Police will work with immigration to review visa approvals and carry out more detailed background checks on holders of such visas.
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