‘Highly adaptable’: Asia’s scam crisis grows as criminal gangs find new ways to avoid crackdowns
- Many scam hubs have now moved from Cambodia beyond the reach of the law into parts of Myanmar and Laos
- Interpol has issued an Orange Notice on the scam trend and shared data with member countries, including China, Cambodia and Laos, to help with law enforcement
The end to Asia’s scam crisis is nowhere in sight as criminal gangs adapt to crackdowns by moving operations to new territories and conjure new tricks to solicit money from victims connected by the internet, Interpol warned on Wednesday.
The “scamdemic” which has pulled in tens of thousands of Asians to work – mostly unwittingly – as scam agents, has whipped across the world with West Africans, South Americans and even Europeans pulled into a vortex of crime worth billions of dollars annually to the networks behind it.
It is a two-sided industry, with educated, tech-savvy young workers trafficked into the scamming trade, while victims from Hong Kong to Singapore, Indonesia to China are carefully sifted out via the internet.
The scammers sell bogus romance, ponzi investment schemes or pose as officials to squeeze a target into a money transfer they never get back.
Many scam hubs, which typically operate from casino compounds converted during the pandemic years, have now moved from Cambodia beyond the reach of the law into parts of Myanmar and Laos.