As I see it | Regional efforts, strong political will the only way to stop ‘cyber slavery’ in Myanmar
- Businessman’s account of being forced to engage in ‘pig butchering scams’ the latest to appear in Chinese state media
- There is opportunity for cooperation between Beijing and Asean to tackle the problem as they face a common enemy
The man, using the pseudonym Li Wei, told the Metropolitan Channel of Henan TV in April that he was lured by a client to the Southeast Asian nation late last year when he tried to chase a payment he was owed.
His story is becoming a familiar one. Like many other victims, the man says he was trafficked by a criminal syndicate and forced to engage in so-called pig butchering scams.
This common form of cyber fraud sees scammers, many of them trafficked, seeking to win the trust of victims by developing romantic or business connections – “fattening the pigs” before they are “butchered” by swindling money from them.
Li told the broadcaster that some of the cyber slaves had even been put in what their captors called a water prison. He said they were locked in rooms filled with water up to their mouths, with sharp nails on the floor that made it hard to stand.
Such accounts have been appearing more frequently in Chinese state media recently as the government seeks to warn the public about these scams.
In what the media called “a very big case”, a court in Chengdu, Sichuan province convicted 34 people late last month over their involvement in a scam ring based in Myanmar.
But the case only involved fraudulent proceeds of several million yuan – meaning the syndicate was just one of the many small operators in the crime hubs that have sprung up along the Moei River in Myanmar.