Thai Police Get Shuffle Crypto Casino Money-Trail Data From 3 Exchanges
Key Takeaways
- Thai cyber police say three crypto exchanges handed over money-trail data linked to Shuffle.com.
- Police set up 80 task-force teams and plan to charge players in Thailand before targeting the operator.
- Gulf Binance flagged two wallets tied to 44 people moving about $113,000 to and from Shuffle, a lawmaker said.
An Interdepartmental Controversy
Police Major General Siriwat Deepho, a deputy inspector general assigned to Thailand’s cyber police, told reporters on Monday that police have received money-trail data from three digital asset exchanges showing flows linked to Shuffle.com. He did not name the platform. Siriwat said officials met that morning to plan next steps and that an operation would certainly follow, adding that 80 task-force teams had been set up for the case.
Siriwat said the case is more complex than that of typical illegal gambling sites, which take deposits through Thai bank accounts. Shuffle is registered in Curaçao and runs on cryptocurrency, with players converting crypto into the platform’s own token to bet.
Because the operator is abroad, police are relying on Section 5 of the criminal code, which he said covers offenses committed outside Thailand that affect the country, and must first build cases against players in Thailand before moving on the operator, he said. He denied that police had neglected the case and said the investigation was underway before it drew media attention.
The briefing followed an Oct. 29 hearing of the House of Representatives’ committee on legal affairs, justice, and human rights, where members questioned why police had not acted on transaction data already in hand. Committee chair Rangsiman Rome said Gulf Binance, the Binance–Gulf Energy joint venture that operates Binance TH, had found two wallets linked to 44 people that moved about $113,000 (3.8 million baht) to and from Shuffle in more than 400 transactions.
Former Democrat Party MP Sirichok Sopha, who first raised the money-trail allegations, said police told the committee that four of nine Thai digital asset operators had onchain links to Shuffle, including Bitkub, Maxbit, and Binance TH. He stressed that the links do not mean the exchanges did anything wrong.
The Department of Special Investigation is weighing whether to take on Shuffle as a special case, and planned to bring in Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission this week. The Digital Economy and Society Ministry said on Oct. 9 that it had blocked Shuffle.com nationwide. The case has also drawn political attention after reports that the husband of Bhumjaithai Party lawmaker Suchada Zhang Thaensap holds a stake in the business behind Shuffle. She said on Oct. 16 that he owns only 1% of a legally registered overseas company and that there is no financial trail linking them to scam networks or transnational crime, MGR Online reported. Neither attended the Oct. 29 hearing.
The Shuffle case comes as Thailand tightens scrutiny of crypto flows. The central bank began flagging large USDT transactions that may sidestep compliance checks earlier this year, and police recently arrested a Chinese national accused of running a $74 million crypto laundering ring. Shuffle did not publicly respond to the police statements at the time of writing, based on available reports.
