China detains 582 for train ticket scalping

BEIJING - Chinese police have seized 582 suspects for online ticket scalping and confiscated over 33,000 tickets in a crackdown on ticket hoarding ahead of the Spring Festival travel rush.

The results came after special police forces were arranged to monitor ticket sales on the national train ticket booking website, identify irregular transactions and pass the information on to railway police's field teams, according to a statement released Wednesday by the railway police bureau.

Police have been carrying out in-depth investigations on possible misconduct in cooperation with the country's major telecommunication companies, including China Mobile and China Telecom, the statement said.

The bureau cited a case in which a woman surnamed Liu in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality was detained for allegedly using "ticket snatching" software to buy 300 tickets using six accounts under the same IP address in order to re-sell at high prices.

Many passengers have complained about difficulties in booking tickets at 12306.cn, the official website of the China Railway Corporation, with many blaming the problem on scalpers who use "ticket snatching" plugins that can automatically acquire a large number of tickets on the website.

The Spring Festival, or Chinese Lunar New Year, will fall on January 31. It is the most important Chinese holiday for family reunions, making it a hectic time for the country's public transportation system.