Turkish authorities have detained 111 suspects after carrying out coordinated raids across 41 provinces in an investigation into alleged illegal betting activity and the laundering of criminal proceeds.
The operation was led by the Cyber Crimes Department and the Diyarbakır Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, with support from the Diyarbakır Police Cyber Crimes Unit.
Investigators said the case focused on suspected offences involving the transfer of funds generated through illegal betting and the laundering of those proceeds through the financial system.
According to findings cited from the Financial Crimes Investigation Board, MASAK, the network under investigation was linked to an estimated transaction volume of TL 35.86bn ($789m).
That figure points to the scale of the financial infrastructure behind unlicensed gambling activity in Turkey, where authorities have increasingly focused on tracing payment channels as well as blocking betting promotion and access routes.
As part of the investigation, officials seized funds held in 190 bank and cryptocurrency accounts.
Authorities also confiscated assets believed to be tied to criminal proceeds, including nine vehicles, among them cars and a motorcycle and two plots of land. The value of those assets was estimated at around TL 10.75m ($236,500).
The breadth of the operation reflects the extent to which illegal betting cases in Turkey now stretch beyond local enforcement actions and into national cybercrime and financial crime coordination.
Recent cases have shown a growing emphasis on identifying the movement of funds, particularly through digital payments and crypto channels, alongside efforts to disrupt advertising and online customer acquisition linked to unlicensed operators.
Turkey maintains a restrictive gambling framework and enforcement activity has intensified in 2026, with multiple agencies taking part in wider crackdowns on illegal betting, gambling promotion and associated financial offences.
The latest operation suggests that authorities are continuing to treat illegal gambling as both a consumer protection issue and a financial crime risk, especially where large transaction volumes and asset accumulation are involved.
Earlier this month, Turkey blocked 15 social media accounts over illegal gambling promotion. Authorities blocked access to 15 social media accounts accused of directing users to illegal gambling sites and imposed TL 49.8m in administrative fines. That action followed earlier operations targeting large-scale illegal betting networks and efforts by MASAK to interrupt suspected laundering flows.
Authorities said the probe covered 190 bank and cryptocurrency accounts, underlining the role digital payment channels can play in illegal betting investigations
