Photo | AI-generated

Scalping is a malignant virus that ruins related industries. The live-entertainment sector has also been badly bruised by scalpers. A barricade has now been put in place against this.

Mobile ticketing SaaS company Masket (CEO Bae Ho-yeon) announced on May 27 the official launch of ‘Scalper Judge,’ a solution that detects all types of illicitly traded tickets in transaction records and blocks them at the entry stage, regardless of whether macros were used. As the follow-up amendment to the Performing Arts Act set to take effect on August 11, 2026, bans fraudulent purchasing and selling irrespective of macro use, the system is drawing attention as a proactive, system-based response tool that event organizers, promoters, and artist agencies can adopt in advance.

Illicitly traded tickets are being caught by the Scalper Judge service

‘Scalper Judge’ is an add-on integrated into Masket’s mobile ticketing platform ‘Qless,’ and it completed its first field operation on May 23 at a university festival with a capacity of 10,000 (event name·host school undisclosed at the client’s request). At that event, 100 scalped tickets out of 11,543 issued were all invalidated at the entry stage, regardless of macro use.

The core of the Performing Arts Act revision is ‘eradicating scalping beyond macros’ — effective August 2026

The revision of the Performing Arts Act implemented in March 2024 explicitly made the sale of scalped tickets using macro programs punishable, and a follow-up amendment that passed the National Assembly’s plenary session on January 29, 2026, went a step further. It prohibits all habitual or for-profit illicit selling and brokering regardless of macro use, introduces penalties of up to 50 times the sale amount, and provides for the confiscation and collection of illicit gains. The follow-up amendment will take effect on August 11, 2026, and it also imposes obligations on ticket sellers and online intermediaries to take technical and administrative measures to prevent fraudulent purchasing and selling.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism stated as the legislative background, “While the current law has only prohibited illicit sales using macros, in reality it is technically difficult to prove whether macros were used, leaving high-price resale and brokering in a regulatory blind spot.” In fact, after macro blocking was tightened, new workarounds such as ‘A-olm (ID handover)’·‘Gye-olm (account handover)’ spread, and reports followed that the enforcement blind spot had grown even larger.

Bae Ho-yeon, CEO of Masket, said, “The real message of this Performing Arts Act revision is ‘we will eradicate scalping beyond macros,’” adding, “Yet the market’s response is still stuck on blocking macros alone. Even the one-month blocking rate of a leading macro-blocking solution was reported at 73.5%, and tickets that slipped through, along with non-macro tactics like account transfer, proxy payments, and proxy purchases, are effectively left unguarded.”

Dual defense of transaction-history detection + entry-stage blocking — regardless of macro use

‘Scalper Judge’ catches illicit trades at two stages. First, it pre-identifies macro traces, abnormal patterns, and resale-suspect transactions from Qless’s issuance and payment data; next, during on-site scanning, it verifies identity to decide entry eligibility. Whether a ticket was created with macros, or passed along without macros through account transfer, proxy payment, or proxy purchase, it gets flagged either by the transaction-data patterns or by identity verification at the entry stage.

In this first field run as well, the most common reason for detection was someone attempting to enter under a name other than their own, and there were also cases where actual resale was directly confirmed. Even during the entry peak between 3 p.m. and 4 p.m., with roughly 1,650 people entering every 30 minutes, processing was completed without any system interruption.

Bae added, “Macro-blocking solutions catch macro traffic at the reservation stage. ‘Scalper Judge’ goes further: whether a ticket was created with macros or transferred without them, it catches all of them at entry through identity verification,” and continued, “Ultimately, who sits in the seat is the final truth, and the key is to base that final check as the standard regardless of macro use.”

From university festivals·K-POP concerts·festivals to corporate invitations·fan meetings

Masket is initially targeting organizers, promoters, and artist agencies of events that draw large crowds, such as university festivals, K-POP concerts, music festivals, fan meetings, and sports events. As macro use and scalping around popular-artist shows and festivals have emerged as a social issue, demand is increasing for system-based, proactive blocking measures rather than post hoc reporting.

At the same time, ‘Scalper Judge’ can be used for small, private events where verifying each attendee’s identity is crucial. For corporate invitation events, closed-door fan meetings, VIP roundtables, and membership-only events where seats are few but list integrity is critical, combining the solution with identity verification can block illicit entry.

Bae added, “We want to make a small contribution to a healthier live-entertainment industry. The era of blocking only macros is over; only by responding to all illicit transactions, macros included, can audiences sit in the right seat at an honest price.”