Why Southeast Asia’s online scam industry is so hard to shut down

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Cambodia’s arrest and extradition of a powerful tycoon accused of running a vast online scam network marks a rare strike against an industry that has stolen tens of billions of dollars worldwide. U.S. and U.K. authorities say Chen Zhi led a transnational criminal enterprise that exploited trafficked workers and defrauded victims worldwide.

For victims, the scams often start small: a text offering a part-time job, asking about weekend availability or simply saying “hello.” On the other end is often a laborer halfway around the world, forced to work 12- to 16-hour days, sending message after message until someone responds.

That human toll is immense. Hundreds of thousands of people are believed to be trapped in forced labor, housed in sprawling compounds across Southeast Asia and compelled to run scams whose sole purpose is to take your money.

Even with a high-profile arrest, dismantling the industry remains extraordinarily difficult. Here’s why:

The Myanmar military last October moved into one of the most well-known scam compounds — the massive KK Park, along the border with Thailand — and announced it had shut the operation down. However, work has continued uninterrupted at other scam centers in Myanmar, where people trafficked from around the world still wait to be rescued.

The raid triggered a mass flight of workers. About 1,500 laborers crossed into Thailand, including hundreds from India as well as citizens from China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Ethiopia and Kenya. Thai military officials said troops later demolished several structures within the massive complex.

KK Park was only one of dozens of such centers along the Thai-Myanmar border — and hundreds more scattered across Southeast Asia — underscoring how difficult it is to dismantle an industry that can quickly shift operations when under pressure.

Scam compounds are often sprawling complexes in rural areas, complete with sleeping quarters, shops and entertainment venues for workers. Developers typically build a single property and lease space inside to multiple companies, allowing numerous operations to run side by side.

Many operate with the protection of local elites. Smaller setups also exist, tucked into a single floor of a legitimate office building or even a rented house in an urban neighborhood.

The centers trace their roots to casinos — both physical and online — that proliferated across Southeast Asia over the past decade. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime counted more than 340 licensed and unlicensed casinos in the region in 2021 alone.

Those casinos, often paired with junket tours, catered to high-rollers from China, where gambling is illegal, and were frequently run by Chinese criminal groups.

When the COVID-19 pandemic and strict travel restrictions cut off customers, some online casinos pivoted. With revenue drying up, operators shifted to a new model: using the same infrastructure and labor to defraud targets around the world through digital scams.

An estimated 120,000 people in Myanmar are being forced to work in online scam operations, along with another 100,000 in Cambodia, according to a 2023 report by the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Those figures are rough estimates, but investigators say scam centers rely on a mix of trafficked victims and workers who arrive willingly — lured by false promises of relatively high pay and easy office jobs.

Early on, most workers came from China and Chinese-speaking countries. Today, the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime says laborers are recruited from at least 56 countries, ranging from Indonesia to Liberia.

For many, the reality is far harsher than advertised. Workers say their passports are often confiscated to prevent them from leaving the compounds. Only senior managers and trusted lieutenants are allowed to move freely. Those who fail to meet targets risk beatings or other physical punishment.

Scammers cast a wide net, targeting victims around the world and increasingly relying on artificial intelligence-powered translation tools to overcome language barriers.

In the Philippines, authorities raided a compound in March 2024 where workers were targeting Chinese nationals with a fake investment scheme. Using scripted messages, scammers posed as senior employees of the state-owned China National Petroleum Corp. and persuaded victims to invest in crude oil futures, according to a script seen by The Associated Press.

Elsewhere, the impact has been just as far-reaching. Last year, about 50 South Koreans were repatriated from Cambodia after being arrested over several months on allegations they worked for online scam operations.

U.S. prosecutors have also targeted the networks behind the schemes. Prosecutors in an indictment against Chen Zhi last year said his organization had scammed at least 250 Americans out of millions of dollars, including one victim who lost $400,000 in cryptocurrency. Americans lost at least $10 billion to scams tied to Southeast Asia in 2024 alone, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.

Cambodian authorities said Wednesday that Chen Zhi and two other Chinese citizens were extradited to China on Tuesday. Chen has dual nationality and his Cambodian citizenship was revoked in December, it said.

The scams take many forms, ranging from cryptocurrency investment schemes to so-called “task scams,” in which victims are asked to pay to unlock the next assignment. In some cases, small amounts of real money are paid out early on to build trust before losses escalate.

Scammers often manufacture urgency, warning targets they will miss out on an opportunity unless they invest by a specific deadline.

Despite government crackdowns and raids that have freed some workers and shut down individual compounds, activists say the people behind the operations largely remain untouched. New scam centers continue to surface across Southeast Asia and beyond.

A United Nations report last year said scammers have extracted billions of dollars from victims using fake romantic relationships, bogus investment pitches and illegal gambling schemes, with operations reported as far away as Africa and Latin America.

“If we only rescue the victims and don’t arrest anybody — especially the Chinese mafia and transnational syndicates — then there will be no point,” said Jay Kritiya, coordinator of the Civil Society Network for Victim Assistance in Human Trafficking.

“They can get more victims. They can scam anytime,” Kritiya said.

FILE - A boy plays near a building, where some people trafficked under false pretenses are being forced to work in online scams targeting people all over the world, in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Feb. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith, File)

FILE - People from China, Vietnam and Ethiopia, believed to have been trafficked and forced to work in scam centers, sit with their faces masked while in detention after being released from the centers in Myawaddy district in eastern Myanmar, Feb. 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Thanaphon Wuttison, File)

FILE - People from China, Vietnam and Ethiopia, believed to have been trafficked and forced to work in scam centers, sit with their faces masked while in detention after being released from the centers in Myawaddy district in eastern Myanmar, Feb. 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Thanaphon Wuttison, File)

FILE -India nationals, believed to have worked at scam center in Myanmar, board a plane at Thailand's Mae Sot International Airport in Tak, before being sent back to India Nov. 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Sarot Meksophawannakul, File)

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Somalia's government on Thursday denied an allegation by the U.S. government that authorities in Mogadishu destroyed an American-funded warehouse belonging to the World Food Program and seized food aid earmarked for impoverished civilians.

The U.S. State Department said Wednesday that it has suspended all assistance from Washington to Somalia’s federal government over the allegations, saying the Trump administration has "a zero-tolerance policy for waste, theft and diversion of life-saving assistance.”

A senior U.S. State Department official said authorities at the Mogadishu port demolished the warehouse of the World Food Program, a Rome-based U.N. agency, at the direction of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud “with no prior notification or coordination with international donor countries, including the United States.” The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private reporting from American diplomats in the region.

Somalia’s foreign ministry said that the food in question wasn't destroyed and that “the commodities referenced in recent reports remain under the custody and control of the World Food Program, including assistance provided by the United States.”

The foreign ministry said expansion and repurposing works at the Mogadishu port are underway as part of broader developments, but ongoing activities there have not affected the custody and distribution of humanitarian assistance.

Somalia “remains fully committed to humanitarian principles, transparency, and accountability, and values its partnership with the United States and all international donors,” it said. It gave no other details.

The WFP told The Associated Press in a statement that its warehouse in Mogadishu port had been demolished by port authorities. The organization said the warehouse contained 75 metric tones of specialized foods intended for the treatment of malnourished pregnant and breastfeeding women and girls and young children.

In a later update, the WFP said it had “retrieved 75 metric tons of nutritional commodities” without explaining further details on how the material was retried.

“The warehouse is crucial for WFP’s emergency operations at a moment when almost a quarter of the population (4.4 million people) are facing crisis levels of hunger or worse in Somalia,” the statement said.

Located in the Horn of Africa, Somalia is one of the world’s poorest nations and has been beset by chronic strife and insecurity exacerbated by multiple natural disasters, including severe droughts, for decades.

The U.S. provided $770 million in assistance for projects in Somalia during the last year of Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration, but only a fraction of that went directly to the government.

The U.S. suspension comes as the Trump administration has ratcheted up criticism of Somali refugees and migrants in the United States, including over fraud allegations involving child care centers in Minnesota. It has slapped significant restrictions on Somalis wanting to come to the U.S. and made it difficult for those already in the United States to stay.

It wasn't immediately clear how much assistance would be affected by the suspension because the Trump administration has slashed foreign aid expenditures, dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development and not released new country-by-country data.

South Sudan, another African country facing conflict and food shortage, is also heavily affected by U.S. aid restrictions. On Thursday, the U.S. suspended foreign assistance to a county in South Sudan's Jonglei state, and similar assistance to Western Bahr el-Ghazal state was under review, the U.S. Embassy in South Sudan said in a statement.

That statement charged that South Sudanese officials “take advantage of the United States instead of working in partnership with us to help the South Sudanese people.”

The U.S. measures “follow continued abuse, exploitation, and theft directed against U.S. foreign assistance by South Sudanese officials at national, state, and county levels,” it said.

There was no immediate comment from South Sudan's government.

Matthew Lee contributed reporting from Washington and Vanessa Gera from Warsaw, Poland. Machol reported from Juba, South Sudan.

FILE - Workers distribute food aid from the World Food Program at a refugee camp in Dolo, Somalia on July 18. 2012. (AP Photo/Jason Straziuso, file)

FILE - In this May 18, 2019 file photo, newly-arrived women who fled drought line up to receive food distributed by local volunteers at a camp for displaced persons in the Daynile neighborhood on the outskirts of the Somalian capital Mogadishu. (AP Photo/Farah Abdi Warsameh, file)