TOKYO: Tokyo police have arrested a Chinese man for allegedly defrauding major game maker Sega Corp. of money in online games.

Yang Haotian, a 32-year-old corporate employee in Tokyo’s Arakawa Ward, is suspected of stealing in-game money worth 80,000 yen in December 2022 by sending false data that related transactions had been properly completed.

Yang has denied the alleged fraud, while admitting that he handled the purchase of in-game money, according to police sources.

On a so-called real money trading, or RMT, website, Yang is believed to have lured customers by saying that he could obtain in-game money at one-twentieth of the official price, and collected at least about 35 million yen from clients between December 2021 to August 2023.

Yang received the IDs and passwords of clients’ game accounts, increased in-game money in the accounts and return the accounts to the clients, the sources said.

Among his clients were a Tokyo resident in his 50s and a resident in the central Japan prefecture of Aichi in his 60s, both of whom were arrested and indicted in June and July. They are believed to have acquired in-game money worth several million yen.

Damage in similar cases since autumn 2022 have totaled about 130 million yen, according to Sega.

JIJI Press