Beijing police have closed down a sophisticated on-line operation selling the services of prostitutes that was bombarding Internet users with millions of messages a month.

In the biggest bust of prostitution related crimes in recent years, Beijing police last week arrested 38 prostitutes, 63 Internet technicians, five gang leaders, an unlicensed medical worker, along with 45 of the prostitutes' clients.

The gang attracted clients for the prostitutes by randomly sending countless messages to Internet users who were logged on to major chat rooms, forums, or through instant messages.

Police say the gang sent more than seven million messages to Internet users in the past month alone. The only job of most of the gang members was to send the soliciting messages from Internet bars.

A reporter with the Beijing Daily says he received 32 on-line solicitations for the services of a prostitute in just a half an hour.

Many messages purported to be from available young, female college students. Other messages directed people to blogs that contained nude pictures of women. In all the messages phone numbers were left where clients could make contact with a prostitute.

Police say the youngest prostitute they arrested was just 15 years old and one of the gang members, surnamed Zhao, treated the prostitutes for venereal disease and provide them with condoms.

The Beijing Daily reports that organized messaging for prostitution services remains rampant in online chat rooms.

Source: Xinhua