Five young men thought they were going to Cambodia to intern at a casino.Instead they say they became enslaved in one of the world’s most sophisticated fraud networks, an industry that has swindled billions of dollars from Americans and turned Southeast Asia into the online scam capital of the world.Subscribe to read this story ad-free Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content.Lured by the promise of well-paying jobs, hundreds of thousands of people like them from China, Southeast Asia and other countries across the world have been coerced into engaging in scams such as posing as women online, cultivating intimate relationships with foreigners to defraud them of their savings in what are known as “pig butchering” schemes.“We were forced to do a job that is an illegal job,” said a 22-year-old victim, one of five men in their 20s from Madagascar who described their experiences to NBC News.
The five men requested anonymity for fear they could be identified by their traffickers, who they believe are still at large.Under pressure from the U.S.and other foreign governments as well as rights groups, Cambodia is cracking down on cybercrime rings that are mostly run by Chinese gangs and have flourished since taking off during the pandemic, passing landmark legislation on the issue in April.
But dismantling Cambodia’s scam industry is no easy task, experts and victims say, pointing to its sophistication, its political connections and its economic entrenchment in the country of 18 million people, where its estimated revenue is equivalent to up to 60% of formal GDP.“It’s good that they finally have a law on the books,” said Cezary Podkul, author of an upcoming book about Southeast Asian scam operations, “The Big Trace.” Even if the law is enforced, however, it “is not the silver bullet that’s going to solve this whole issue,” he said.In April, the U.S.Department of Justice said it had frozen $700 million in alleged scam-rel...