Cybercrime syndicates are luring tech-savvy South Africans to Southeast Asia with fake job promises before holding them captive and forcing them to carry out online scams around the world.
Organisations devoted to fighting human trafficking say most such victims — lured from more than 60 countries — end up in Myanmar (Burma), Laos and Cambodia. Since January, the hotline of the anti-trafficking network A21 has responded to 44 victims connected to forced criminality in these fraud factories — up from three cases last year.
Interpol reports that cybercrimes such as romance-investment scams — dubbed “pig-butchering” — cryptofraud and illegal gambling have exploded globally since the pandemic struck.
Katie Modrau, South Africa country manager for A21, said the group’s hotline “has received multiple reports about South Africans trapped in this forced criminality in Southeast Asian compounds”.
Modrau said A21 had reported these cases to the national intersectoral committee on trafficking in persons, which brings together officials from various government departments, the police and the National Prosecuting Authority.
“We have worked well with the [South African] embassies in these countries on previous repatriations but these were for victims who had already escaped the compounds and needed assistance back home,” she said.
People are openly sold across compounds, which use different types of torture to make them effective scammers
— Jason Tower
South Africans are among the “tens of thousands” of captives trapped in this “modern form of slavery” in Southeast Asia, said security analyst Jason Tower, Burma country director for the US Institute of Peace (USIP). The number of South African captives is unknown.
The USIP reports that that people from 66 countries, 22 of them in Africa, have been “tricked, coerced or forced” into this type of activity run by organised crime syndicates. The jobs advertised were typically in tech, telesales, hotels or casinos.
Once victims arrive, their handlers often use psychological and physical torture to force them to scam strangers, family or friends, Tower said. “People are openly sold across compounds, which use different types of torture to make them effective scammers.”
Justice department spokesperson Chrispin Phiri said that an Interpol operation was carried out in August last year targeting human trafficking in Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. At that time, no South African victims were reported to be among the victims.
Phiri said the Hawks had recently opened a case about a suspicious offer of a job in Southeast Asia that was made to a South African. “However, South Africa cannot investigate criminality in another country. We have to rely on mutual legal assistance,” he said.
Clayson Monyela, spokesperson for the department of international relations & co-operation, said the issue had not been raised with the department.
International media including the BBC, CNN Killed by a scam: A father took his life after losing his savings to international criminal gangs. He’s not the only one, Al Jazeera and India’s The Economic Times have published detailed stories about the rise of these cyberscams since the pandemic.
The UN Human Rights Office, the Global Initiative for Transnational Organised Crime, USIP and Interpol are among those who have raised the alarm about the industrial-scale online scamming operations.
Most recruits into the Southeast Asian compounds are men and many are well educated, computer literate and multilingual, according to a UN report, Online Scam Operations and Trafficking into Forced Criminality into Southeast Asia: Recommendations for a Human Rights Response, published in August last year.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, is clear that people coerced into these scamming operations “are victims... not criminals”.
Some of those who have escaped the syndicates say the usual modus operandi is to fly victims to Bangkok then take them across the border to Myanmar, Cambodia or Laos, where armed gangs shut them in compounds and take their passports. The gangs control and monitor their contact with the outside world.
Typically the scammers are forced to create fake online profiles and chat to victims over months to win their trust and steal their money. If they do not meet daily quotas, they face food deprivation, electric shocks and other forms of abuse and torture, the UN and USIP report. They receive token payment, if they are paid at all.
Sometimes the victims are told they have incurred debts amounting to $10,000 (R180,000) or more, and will be released only if their families pay a ransom of that amount; but the ransom could be reduced if they recruited other victims.
If a prospective job sounds too good to be true, it probably is, said Modrau, whose organisation does online job vetting to prevent trafficking.
Fake job ads for positions such as data entry clerks or telesales can be convincing. But they often promise unrealistic salaries — more than R100,000 a month in some cases — plus bonuses, with all living and travel expenses covered.
Recruiting syndicates use platforms such as Zoom and WhatsApp and the process is rushed, Modrau said.
A USIP report last month, “Transnational Crime in Southeast Asia: A Growing Threat to Global Peace and Security”, warns that criminal networks have flooded online recruitment and matchmaking platforms with fake jobs and fake profiles.
“Platforms such as Facebook, Messenger, Jobs.com, and Tinder can no longer be assumed to be safe... For the first time in human history, almost anyone anywhere can become a victim of human trafficking simply by looking for a job or a date online.”
Modrau said: “We want to urge South African's to be vigilant with accepting job opportunities in the Southeast Asia region without thorough research.”
• Suspect trafficking? Call the national human trafficking hotline: 0800-222777 or e-mail: suntimes@sundaytimes.co.za
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