Cyberscam networks in Cambodia have freed more than 400 Indonesians this month, Jakarta said on Monday, after Phnom Penh announced a fresh crackdown on the illicit industry.
Scammers working from hubs across Southeast Asia, some willingly and others trafficked, lure internet users globally into fake romances and cryptocurrency investments, netting tens of billions of dollars each year.
Some foreign nationals have left suspected scam compounds across Cambodia this month as the government pledged to “eliminate” problems related to the online fraud trade, which the United Nations says employs at least 100,000 people in Cambodia alone.
Recent Cambodian law enforcement measures resulted in “many online scam syndicates… letting their workers go”, Indonesia’s ambassador to Cambodia, Santo Darmosumarto, said in a video posted to social media.
Between January 1 and 18, 440 Indonesians came to the embassy in Phnom Penh after they had been “released by online scam syndicates”, many seeking to return home, according to a post on Instagram.
“Because Cambodia’s crackdown will continue, the embassy predicts many more will flow in from the provinces,” Santo said.
He said the Indonesians who went to the embassy had been “involved in online scams” for anywhere between a few months and several years, and some had their passports taken from them.
Santo said the embassy would expedite repatriations but all Indonesians were “being directed to return home independently”.
– ‘Police were coming’ –
Dozens of people, some with suitcases, lined up outside the Indonesian embassy on Monday.
An 18-year-old from Indonesia’s Sumatra said he fled a compound in Bavet city, near Cambodia’s border with Vietnam, where he was forced to scam people online for eight months without pay despite being promised $600 per month.
He told AFP he arrived in Phnom Penh on Sunday and came to the embassy to ask for a new passport because his was “with a Chinese boss”.
“They heard police were coming inside the compound, so they let everyone go,” he said.
Transnational crime groups, mostly based in Cambodia and Myanmar, initially largely targeted Chinese speakers, but have expanded their vast scam operations into multiple languages.
About 100 people were also queueing outside the Chinese embassy in Phnom Penh on Monday, but those approached by AFP declined to speak.
China’s foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said Beijing “attaches great importance to the safety of Chinese citizens overseas” when asked at a regular news briefing about the lines outside the embassy in Cambodia.
Cambodia arrested and deported Chinese-born tycoon Chen Zhi, accused of running internet scam operations from Cambodia, to China this month.
Chen, a former Cambodian government adviser, was indicted by US authorities in October.
– Not the end –
Mark Taylor, an anti-trafficking expert in Cambodia, said Chen’s extradition seemed to have sent shockwaves through the scam industry, with some operators likely fearing legal consequences and opting to release people or evacuate their compounds.
Many scam operators likely fear “that they’re going to face punishment, eventually”, Taylor told AFP.
But he noted alleged links between politicians and scam networks, and previous crackdowns that amounted to “showcase, preformative acts”.
The latest measures were likely just “another transaction” — a tactical move to shift equipment, managers and workers, and stay in business, said Taylor.
“There’s no evidence that this is really an end of the industry.”
Cambodian officials have denied allegations of government involvement, with authorities saying around 5,000 people were arrested in scam raids in the last six months.
After rights monitors and media reports linked Cambodian tycoons to the scam industry for years, the first prominent local businessman to be prosecuted, Ly Kuong, was charged last week with human trafficking, money laundering and running several scam compounds.
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