The department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) levied sanctions against “a large network of scam centers” in the region, including nine targets in Shwe Kokko, Myanmar, “a notorious hub for virtual currency investment scams under the protection of the OFAC-designated Karen National Army,” according to a Monday (Sept. 8) press release.
The action also included 10 targets based in Cambodia, coming after Americans lost $10 billion to cyber scams stemming from Southeast Asia in 2024. That marks a 66% increase from 2023, per the release.
“Southeast Asia-based criminal organizations often recruit individuals to work in scam centers under false pretenses,” the release said. “Using debt bondage, violence and the threat of forced prostitution, the scam operators coerce individuals to scam strangers online using messaging apps or by sending text messages directly to a potential victim’s phone.”
These coerced people will often use the promise of romantic relationships or friendship to gain victims’ trust, according to the release. From there, they convince their victims to make “investments” using digital currency on websites designed to resemble legitimate investment platforms, but are actually controlled by the scammers.
“The scam operators specifically look to recruit individuals with English language skills to target American victims,” the release said. “Former scammers have reported that they were directed to specifically target Americans, and some even had quotas for the number of targets per day.”
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Featurespace Chief Operating Officer Tim Vanderham told PYMNTS about the rise of organized scam operations, or “scam dens,” in an interview last year.
“When you think about the billions and billions of dollars that come from scams globally,” the money made from ill-gotten gains exceeds the revenues of some of the world’s largest businesses.
Meanwhile, the PYMNTS Intelligence report “How Scammers Tailor Financial Scams to Individual Consumer Vulnerabilities” found that “mass personalization has become the defining feature of modern fraud.”
The report revealed that 30% of adults in the United States, or about 77 million people, have lost money in scams within the last five years, many of them suffering losses of more than $500.
