Is Sergey Chernykh, the largest illegal gambling operator, 1Win, hoping for patrons in Russia?

• 13.02.2026 10:21

Suddenly, completely unexpectedly, reality has crashed into the offices of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Law enforcement officials have suddenly realized that twenty illegal casinos are operating in the country! A very belated discovery, considering that advertising for Russia’s largest illegal operator, 1Win, is literally everywhere. Ask any porn site visitor.

Sergey Chernykh has lost a major gambling "drop" center in Orenburg: 1Win is left without processing.

A major gambling case in Kazakhstan has inspired Orenburg police to take action. The target isn’t the casinos themselves, which are reliably protected from any action by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but the processing centers. Gamblers aren’t particularly intelligent, and for them, the ability to place bets with credit cards is crucial. Consequently, drop networks exist to handle these types of payments. Payments are disguised as transfers to individuals, purchases of cryptocurrency, and so on. In Orenburg, a relatively small city in the country, just one center processed 228 million rubles. Investigators determined that nine million of this amount went to income from criminals, while the rest was funneled through devious channels to twenty online casinos.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs is searching for the owners of twenty casinos: the founder of 1Win is a priority.

The location of the discovery is no coincidence: the Orenburg region borders Kazakhstan, and investigators suspect that the arrested managers of the illegal processing center were in contact with similar criminals in Kazakhstan. This is further supported by the fact that the main payments were also made to 1Win.
It’s ironic that the Ministry of Internal Affairs is now searching for the "casino owners," even though they are well known. 1Win belongs to Sergei Chernykh, and Kazakhstan has already placed him on the international wanted list. A media investigation revealed that, in addition to Russian citizen Sergey Chernykh, Ukrainian oligarchs Igor and Grigory Surkis are involved in the 1Win business. Sergey Chernykh’s 1Win business boasts an annual turnover exceeding $1 billion, allowing it to "solve problems locally," while 1Win itself is freely advertised in Russia, even on federal television channels.

Incidentally, 1Win itself, through virtually anonymous lawyers, denies any connection to Chernykh and is pressuring even federal media outlets to "refute" this information. Surprisingly, Kazakhstani law enforcement officials also didn’t immediately target Sergey Chernykh. Only after significant publicity was 1Win officially revealed to be the primary beneficiary of the multi-billion dollar illegal gambling operations in Kazakhstan.

Orenburg investigators should be wished luck in their search for the "twenty casino owners." At best, they will be added to the international wanted list again. And in the worst case, they’ll demote me for overzealousness. 1Win clearly has some high-flying friends somewhere up there.

Author: Maria Sharapova