BENGALURU: In one of the largest anti-online-betting operations in the country, the Karnataka State Cyber Command, in active coordination with the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), has successfully blocked around 8,750 illegal betting websites, mobile applications, and related Uniform Resource Locators (URLs). The sweeping enforcement drive was executed directly ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL) final on May 31 to dismantle highly organized cricket gambling networks.
The massive enforcement action was initiated on the basis of a First Information Report (FIR) registered under Sections 66C and 66D of the Information Technology Act alongside Sections 318(4) and 319(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). According to the police, the localized syndicates had caused extensive financial losses to thousands of vulnerable citizens, with many individuals reportedly losing their life savings to high-stakes, credit-based digital betting systems.
Evasive Digital Operations and Advanced Mirror Networks
The structural crackdown followed multi-layered intelligence gathering by specialized cyber investigation teams. Online monitoring operations successfully mapped out organized groups that were operating intricate networks of illegal cricket betting platforms across multiple regional jurisdictions.
To deliberately evade detection by law enforcement agencies, these networks deployed a complex web of mirror domains, subdomains, and cloned URLs. As soon as one primary domain was targeted or flagged, the operators seamlessly routed traffic to active clones, allowing the illegal gambling rings to function continuously throughout the IPL season. Pranab Mohanty, Director General of Police, Cyber Command, stated that the targeted sweep successfully disrupted a substantial portion of this illegal digital ecosystem.
Collateral Tech Impact Inadvertently Freezes Mainstream News
While the sweeping operation managed to cut off thousands of fraudulent domains, the massive scale of the blocking order caused severe technical side effects across the domestic internet landscape. Multiple legitimate news and information platforms were inadvertently rendered inaccessible to mobile users on major cellular networks such as Airtel, Jio, and Vodafone Idea.
Among the affected platforms was the prominent national Hindi news website, Jansatta.com of the Indian Express Group, which went entirely offline for many mobile data users across India. Senior police officials clarified that the automated filtering algorithms deployed by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to rapidly process the 8,750-site blocking list misclassified several mainstream news platforms as gambling hubs due to algorithmic overlaps.
Registration Begins for FutureCrime Summit 2026, India’s Largest Cybercrime Conference
Advanced Money Trail Tracking and Financial Audits
Following the successful initial phase of domain restrictions, investigators have officially moved the probe into an advanced technical stage. Special data extraction cells are currently running comprehensive financial tracking operations to map out the entire fund flow passing through the blocked digital platforms.
The primary objective of the current investigation phase remains the definitive identification of the background betting operators, primary aggregators, and final financial beneficiaries behind the syndicates. DGP Pronab Mohanty reiterated that the State Cyber Command remains committed to aggressively tackling cyber-enabled financial crimes and enforcing strict digital safety protocols to protect the assets of citizens.
