Home / Poker News July 2013 / The Poker Grapevine - Masa Kagawa in Deep Trouble
The Poker Grapevine - Masa Kagawa in Deep Trouble
Posted by: Mark Baldwing - Fri, 2013-07-26 08:40
Who said that poker players were a generally honest and fair bunch? These are guys who deceive their opponents for a living, and like every segment of society, they have elements among them who won’t think twice about breaking actual laws. Earlier this week, the Chiba Prefectural Police arrested nine people in Japan, charging them with running a scam dating site as well as a malware ring aimed at Android users. Such arrests happen all the time of course, but what makes this bit of news interesting for members of the
online poker community is the fact that 50-year-old high stakes poker player Masa Kagawa was also among the nine men arrested.
Although quite successful at the green felt, Kagawa is definitely not living solely off his poker profits. He is the president of a Tokyo IT company called Koei Planning, which had apparently taken to spam-distribution via Android Enesoluty, a personal contact information predator-app, before the Japanese authorities put an end to the scheme.
According to the authorities, the operation had been started in September last year and it ran through April this year, when the police first began taking steps against the company.
Kagawa and his “colleagues”, or rather partners in crime, managed to collect some 37 million email addresses off android devices, which they then used to send out spam through which they lured victims to a scam dating site called Sakura. The online dating service ran for just 5 months, but during that time, it earned around 390 million yen (almost $4 million).
Kagawa used to be a staple presence at the various APPT events over the years and he once finished 3rd in the Aussie Millions $100k high roller. In 2012, he finished 5th in the EPT’s Monte Carlo Grand Final Super High Roller.
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