Men convicted for fraudulent FIFA currency worth as much as $16 million
We recently heard about a group of men that were being charged by the United Kingdom Gambling Commission for their website that allowed for users to bet using FIFA game currency, the first of its kind to place criminal charges against an individual for allowing for gambling using a video game currency with real money value. This case has opened up even further after charges have been placed against one of the men after finding a computer software program that was allowing the group to obtain millions of dollars in FIFA coin currency.
The FIFA currency wasn’t meant to have any actual real world value, but third party markets that allow for players to buy and sell the currency put a monetary value on the currency. This is also how these types of gambling platforms have been able to pop up, since they use the real world monetary value of these virtual currencies to incentive players to gamble in an unregulated system.
The United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District located down in Texas was able to convict Anthony Clark for a conspiracy to commit wire fraud as part of his involvement in the illegal activities surrounding the FIFA currency. The trial was held over a period of three days in which prosecutors were able to show the jury a variety of evidence that showed just how the men involved managed to defraud Electronic Arts, the maker of the popular FIFA game.
While playing the game players are able to earn FIFA coins, which can then be used in order to acquire new characters for your team and was made largely popular by the FIFA Ultimate Team game mode. This made obtaining the currency a primary goal for players invested in the game that wanted to be able to improve their teams and be more competitive. There are limits on how many coins a player can earn, with the cap being set at 500 for a single match. These coins cannot be obtained from EA Games with real money, but they do offer points that can be used to purchase packs. These points transactions have earned the gaming company millions.
The software that the group that Mr. Clark was involved with would log thousands of matches in just a few seconds, meaning a substantial income of coins. They managed to turn around and sell these coins for $16 million. The black market value for these coins was set at about 100,000 for $20. The main buyers of the coins were based out of China and the United Kingdom.
FutGalaxy was a popular gambling website that used FIFA coins as a currency, which Anthony Clark had a significant involvement in. Not only could players use this site to purchase player packs using coins instead of points, but it would allow them to gamble and try to increase their earnings – while steadily bringing in a profit for unregulated operators. EA Games has explicit rules against third party sales of their virtual currency.
