Chinese police have uncovered a major international underground online gambling ring, arresting 90 suspects and smashing more than 500 gambling websites that solicited 1 million people to gamble, the Ministry of Public Security said on Tuesday.

Police officers in Guangdong and Hunan provinces froze 3,000 bank accounts related to the case and gambling funds totaling 500 billion yuan ($78.4 billion), according to the ministry.

All of the web servers were located in Taiwan, and the service staff and some technicians who helped to solve network problems were in Hong Kong, Thailand and the Philippines, the ministry said. Most of the gamblers were from the Chinese mainland, it added.

"Due to the pursuit of huge benefits and loopholes in social management, the number of people addicted to online gambling is posing a serious threat to family harmony and social stability," the ministry said.

The case dates to August last year, when police in Yue yang, Hunan, found that a ring member had logged onto the gambling website in a local Internet bar. In the subsequent investigation, police uncovered more than 500 similar websites suspected of being involved in gambling.

Hunan police also discovered that all the 500 suspicious websites had registered their domain names in Shen zhen, Guangdong.

Since January, Hunan police received many reports from the public that some local villagers had been threatened or forced to pay back the gambling debts by the criminal gang, and the number of criminal cases related to gambling has been rising sharply.

In March, the ministry set up a special investigation team and deployed Guangdong and Hunan police to collect information and find the suspects.

In July, under the direction of the ministry, Guangdong police raided the illegal online companies and detained 84 suspects in five cities in Guangdong, including Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Shantou. They destroyed 12 gambling dens. Police also froze the ill-gotten assets at 14 commercial banks.

zhangyan1@chinadaily.com.cn