All 500 wristbands disappeared at once
Possible links to scalping rings raised
Precedent: chemical tampering at the Gwanghwamun show
Inevitable criticism over security management gaps
BTS posing. Provided by BigHit Music
At a BTS concert venue, 500 admission wristbands vanished.
Police said they received a report at around 3:20 p.m. on the 11th that a man fled with 500 concert-entry wristbands from the ticket booth at the auxiliary stadium of Goyang Sports Complex in Ilsanseo-gu, Goyang, Gyeonggi Province. Based on the suspect’s appearance and clothing, officers launched a search focusing on key nearby routes.
The stolen wristbands are supplementary admission items and cannot be used on their own to enter. The entry procedure for this concert is designed to go through three steps: mobile QR-code identity verification, ID check, and a staff member directly putting the wristband on the attendee. The wristbands are made of a special material that cannot be reattached once damaged, and random rechecks are conducted after entry.
Beyond simple theft, the possibility of links to scalping rings is also being raised. During BTS’s Gwanghwamun comeback show in March, scalpers were found attempting unauthorized entry by chemically rejoining wristbands or by accompanying ticket buyers and linking the wristbands on the spot. At that time, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the National Police Agency detected 1,868 tickets suspected of scalping and referred 105 of them for investigation. This underlies concerns that the stolen wristbands could be abused in similar ways.
The chief of the Gyeonggi Northern Police Agency visited Goyang Sports Complex before the opening of the show to conduct a safety inspection and deployed dozens of personnel dedicated to cracking down on scalping. However, it emerged that the admission wristbands, a core item for event operations, were left exposed at the auxiliary stadium’s ticket booth, making criticism over security management gaps unavoidable.
This concert is the Goyang stop of BTS’s world tour ‘Arirang’ (ARIRANG), held over four days from the 9th to the 12th at the main stadium of Goyang Sports Complex. As a mega-scale show with every seat for all dates sold out, attention is focused on the whereabouts of the stolen wristbands and whether they will be misused.
