These are real scam factories that are wreaking havoc in Southeast Asia. These state-of-the-art complexes exploit thousands of forced laborers to cheat victims around the world. At a high price: $64 billion per year.
The scourge of online scams orchestrated by the underworld is gaining worrying proportions in Asia. According to a report by the United States Institute of Peace Or USIP, organized crime groups rake in nearly $64 billion each year through these massive scams. In Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, this staggering loot would represent 40% of the combined GDP of these three countries! A figure which illustrates the sprawling influence of these 2.0 scam syndicates, reaping astronomical criminal profits on the backs of thousands of duly trapped victims.
Behind these vast phishing and investment scam campaigns lie ultra-modern “scam factories”, exploiting a captive workforce in deplorable conditions. They are reminiscent of these factories in China, which run racks of smartphones for large-scale fraud.
The dark online scam factories of the Asian underworld
To carry out their dirty work, these criminal syndicates have spared no expense. They have built veritable ultra-modern complexes in South-East Asia housing their “workers” of the scam, in conditions close to the prison world. High surrounding walls, surveillance watchtowers, interrogation rooms… These sinister “scam factories” leave nothing to chance to maintain maximum control over their miserable workforce.
Inside, it’s a nightmare: overcrowded open spaces where hundreds of people hack tirelessly to lure new victims on social networks and dating applications. A deployment of well-established social engineering techniques to gain the trust of targets and convince them to invest in fictitious products which only add money to the thugs’ coffers. Recently, a French woman lost nearly 90,000 euros because of this method.
Entire teams are trained to carry out massive phishing campaigns fishing for pigeons fooled by these high-flying crooks. Successful investments for the gangs, but nothing but wind for the cheats who will never see the color of their money again.
The hell of slave workers of scam 2.0
After being lured under false pretenses, such as job offers in the digital entertainment industry, hundreds of thousands of people found themselves trapped in these centers, reduced to modern slavery by criminal gangs. Locked up, beaten, starved… All in a climate of permanent terror to force them to cooperate.
“ We were threatened with reprisals against our families if we disobeyed », Testifies Ming, a survivor who fled this nightmare at the risk of his life. “ I was manhandled, tortured with a hot iron after a slip. I had crazy quotas of scams to fill under penalty of food deprivation “. A nameless hell with death as the only escape.
These tragic stories are repeated throughout the region where these mafia centers thrive thanks to the corruption of local elites. In Cambodia, a powerful senator from the ruling party receives bribes despite his doubly crooked casino. In Myanmar, the military junta turns a blind eye to this trafficking in exchange for bribe payments.
“ These complexes are often established in partnership with the big names of the regime, in poorly regulated areas where impunity is total. », denounces the report, calling for a relentless international mobilization to dismantle these networks of crooks.
Source : PICU, The record
Ex-corporate journalist, the world of the web, networks, connected machines and everything that is written on the Internet whets my appetite. From the latest TikTok trend to the most liked reels, I come from the Facebook generation that still fascinates the internal war between Mac and PC. As a wise woman, the Internet, its tools, practices and regulation are among my favorite hobbies (that, lineart, knitting and bad jokes). My motto: to try it is to adopt it, but in complete safety.
Read other articles
5