Digital Slavery in Myanmar: Inside the Expanding Web of Fraudulent Factories

Myanmar, torn by civil conflict, has emerged as one of the largest hubs for cybercrime globally. Over the past few years, hundreds of thousands of foreigners responding to offers of high-paying jobs have been kidnapped and forced into the operations of fraudulent call centers.

These scam complexes are rapidly expanding along the border with Thailand, generating tens of billions of dollars annually for their organizers.

Myanmar (formerly known as Burma until 1989) gained independence from Britain in 1948. Almost immediately, a prolonged civil war erupted between the official government, communist opposition, and various ethnic militant groups that aligned with them.

The trajectory towards democratization announced in the 2008 Constitution allowed for the first free elections in 2015, which were won by former political prisoner and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

However, she was ousted in a military coup in 2021, sparking massive protests that, when suppressed, ignited yet another cycle of civil war that continues to this day.

Currently, Myanmar is led by the State Administration Council, with its chairman, Min Aung Hlaing, serving as the country’s de facto leader but with limited authority. Different armed ethnic groups control separate parts of the country.

Global powers are also involved in reshaping spheres of influence. In 2013, China’s President Xi Jinping announced the grand investment initiative known as the Belt and Road Initiative, aimed at integrating the Chinese economy into the global market. Myanmar was identified as one of the target countries. However, alongside infrastructure development in this impoverished nation, this also created opportunities for shadowy enterprises.

In Karen State, near the Thai border, new cities designed as gambling hubs for clients from China have sprung up over the years. Gambling is prohibited in mainland China and most Southeast Asian countries, but in this war-torn area of Myanmar, enforcement is virtually nonexistent. In practice, casinos are often fronts for various forms of criminal activity.

Transnational organized crime in Southeast Asia is now evolving at an unprecedented pace.

In Myanmar, the lack of oversight from official authorities and the protection offered by armed ethnic groups have fostered conditions for a flourishing drug trade. According to a report by UNODC, in December 2024, Myanmar was the primary producer of opium and heroin.

Cybercrime, money laundering, underground banking, and human trafficking have reached industrial scales as well.

Approximately 60 complexes along the Thailand-Myanmar border house fraudulent call centers. The first and now largest scam factory, KK Park, was built between 2019 and 2020.

By late 2020 and early 2021, kidnapped individuals from various countries were being brought into these complexes and coerced into participating in scam operations.

The factories are constantly expanding, with new structures being constructed regularly. In 2023, the estimated number of people residing there reached 120,000, but this figure has now risen to between 150,000 and 200,000.

Foreigners are lured through social media with job offers from Thai companies in sectors such as IT, logistics, hospitality, education, digital marketing, or online sales.

These advertisements typically provide brief details about the job conditions and responsibilities. Salaries are often inflated compared to average figures, and a quick online search can often indicate the company’s legitimacy.

Larger scam firms may even organize several interviews with HR representatives, direct supervisors, and regional managers, as well as conduct English proficiency tests.

Candidates are often provided with tickets to Bangkok, and in some cases, visas are arranged, with reimbursements offered upon arrival.

Once at the airport, individuals are taken to Mae Sot, a town in northwestern Thailand. Here, they are smuggled into Myanmar across the Moei River. The scam complexes can be seen from the shore, surrounded by antennas that disrupt GPS signals.

Upon arrival, disoriented individuals have their passports and phones confiscated, and they receive instructions for the scam operations. The most common schemes include «pig butchering» and its variant—romantic scams. The objective is to build trust with potential victims and convince them to invest in fake cryptocurrency projects. Unwitting scammers utilize generative AI technologies and stolen data from the dark web for authentication purposes.

According to UNODC estimates, «pig butchering» schemes in Southeast Asia generate more revenue than the drug trade. Just one complex, KK Park, reportedly generates tens of millions of dollars monthly.

In September 2024, the analytical firm Chainalysis noted a shift in the focus of criminals from Ponzi schemes to «pig butchering.» In the United States, $4.4 billion of the total $5.6 billion in crypto fraud losses for 2023 was attributed to this type of scam. Experts established a connection between the largest cryptocurrency wallet associated with this scheme and KK Park.

Cryptocurrencies serve as the primary medium for payments and transactions. Some workers specialize in the memecoin industry, managing branded X accounts and operating bot farms. Low initial investments and the potential for sudden «rug pulls» make «funny coins» an ideal avenue for criminal income.

Other cybercrimes include real estate fraud, online shopping scams, and hacking of financial services and other potentially lucrative targets.

Scammers frequently target Western countries, requiring employees to work long hours—17 to 18 hours a day. Each person has a revenue target: one former employee was expected to produce $5,000 weekly, while another was tasked with generating $10,000 per month.

Failure to meet targets or refuse work leads to physical punishments from managers, including torture and complete isolation in a dark room without food. The most defiant workers may eventually be sold to other scam complexes.

Most centers do not accept ransom payments; those that do have varying prices:, with KK Park demanding $1,500 to $3,000, and Apollo charging $4,000 to $6,000. However, even if these amounts are paid, freedom for the victim is not guaranteed.

According to human rights organizations, each factory has a managing director, often of ethnic Chinese descent, with some centers being co-owned by Thais. Each complex is rented by 30 to 40 different companies, each with its hierarchy: bosses, supervisors, team leads, and smaller subordinate teams, amounting to 50 to 250 people.

Victims of such criminal schemes include residents from Southeast Asia (China, Taiwan, Indonesia, and others), Africa (primarily Kenya and Nigeria), and there have been increasing cases involving citizens from Western and, less frequently, post-Soviet countries.

According to UNODC, the fraudulent complexes operating in Myanmar collectively generate about $40 billion annually.

A number of sources assert that the network is controlled by Chinese crime lords involved in gambling zone projects along the Myanmar-Thailand border.

Reports indicate that one of the likely beneficiaries is Chinese businessman She Zhijian, head of Hong Kong’s Yatai International Holding Group and key investor in the Shwe Kokko «resort city» project in Karen State, Myanmar.

With a price tag of $15 billion, the project planned to build casinos, luxury hotels, and entertainment complexes, in collaboration with the Border Guard Forces of Karen State (BGF)—former insurgents now granted legal status.

Despite public distancing by project founders from ties to fraudulent centers, local residents told BBC reporters that scam companies are located within buildings throughout Shwe Kokko.

As early as 2020, Beijing denied any connection between the project and the Belt and Road Initiative following reports of potential illegal activities and supported investigations into possible violations.

In 2022, She Zhijian was arrested in Bangkok on charges of running illegal online casinos, while he claimed the case was politically motivated. Yatai International Holdings Group denies any involvement in criminal activities, including human trafficking.

Another figure linked to the organization of fraudulent complexes is Macau crime lord Wang Quok Koi, known as «Broken Tooth,» who is a principal investor in special economic zones in Sai Sumpan and Huangyan near the town of Myawaddy.

Broken Tooth rose to power in the 1980s and 1990s as a member of the 14K triad—one of Hong Kong’s largest gangs. However, after a failed assassination attempt on a prosecutor in 1998, he was arrested. Released in 2012, he reinvented himself as a patriotic businessman supporting the Chinese Communist Party.

Wang Quok Koi invests in casinos, real estate across Asia, and cryptocurrencies, even creating his own coins, Dragon Coin and Hong (Triad) Coin.

In 2018, he established the World Association of History and Culture of Hoonmen. In 2020, it, along with two of Wang’s other organizations—the Dongmei Group and the Hoonmen Palau-China Cultural Association—was placed on the US sanctions list for facilitating organized crime, including through cryptocurrency.

It’s unclear how the sanctions have affected Wang’s business. Recent evidence suggests that his network of affiliated enterprises continues to expand from Southeast Asia into Africa, the Middle East, and North America.

The Thai prosecutor’s office, along with the Department of Special Investigations, is gathering evidence for cases of human trafficking and fraudulent call centers that could lead to arrest warrants for three military officers from Myanmar, including the aforementioned Colonel So Chit Tu of the Karen National Army (KNA), Lieutenant Colonel Mott Thon, and Major Tin Win.

Experts note their deep business ties with Chinese gangs and immunity due to substantial influence in the region.

In May 2025, KNA, So Chit Tu, and his two sons, So Htu E Mu and So Chit Chit, were added to the US sanctions list for orchestrating large-scale cyber fraud, human trafficking, and smuggling.

Reuters journalists traced the funds of several «pig butchering» victims, all of whom invested in a fake cryptocurrency site and unwittingly sent money to the scammers’ wallets.

After a series of transactions, the assets were moved to wallets where KK Park accumulates fraud revenues. These funds were then transferred in several direct payments to other accounts. One address on the Binance cryptocurrency exchange received approximately $9.1 million from February to October 2022. Journalists determined that the wallet was registered to Chinese businessman Wang Yi Cheng from Bangkok.

In total, from January 2021 to October 2022, his account processed transactions amounting to around $87.5 million. Subsequently, these funds were sent to 50 other addresses, including exchange wallets.

At the time of receiving these funds, Wang held a position as vice president of the Thai-Asia Economic Exchange Trade Association, located in a building on the outskirts of Bangkok, which also housed the Overseas Center for Cultural Exchange Hoonmen.

In February 2023, regulators in Thailand conducted searches of both offices, suspecting they served as fronts for organized crime and were linked to Wang Quok Koi’s group.

In addition to shell companies, illicit funds are also laundered through investments in casinos, special economic zones, the real sector, and real estate in Southeast Asia, primarily in Cambodia and Laos.

Blockchain payment applications, proprietary cryptocurrencies, and an extensive network of unlicensed over-the-counter exchanges are also used. In April 2025, Thai authorities conducted a series of large-scale raids on these companies’ offices, uncovering over 1,000 unauthorized transactions totaling more than $425 million USDT. Investigators traced the payments back to drug trafficking and cyber fraud networks.

Myanmar’s central bank does not recognize cryptocurrency as legal tender, and financial institutions and individuals are prohibited from conducting transactions with it.

Owning or trading digital assets could lead to imprisonment or fines. As a result, operations occur mostly in an informal manner.

In December 2021, the opposition National Unity Government, composed of supporters of the ousted Aung San Suu Kyi, recognized USDT as the official currency. It also considered launching a CBDC and establishing a neobank using the Polygon platform.

In the Thai town of Mae Sot, the office of human rights organization Global Alms is dedicated to rescuing kidnapped individuals.

Volunteers Judah and Michelle conduct rescue operations during the transfer of victims between scam complexes. Typically, the route always passes through Thailand for speed and safety.

Victims contact human rights advocates themselves, allowing them to track their geolocation. They follow the kidnappers’ vehicle and signal the most suitable moments for escape. Not every rescue attempt is successful.

Sometimes groups of forced workers organize their own escape from the scam centers.

Criminals take advantage of Myanmar’s complex political situation. The government refuses accountability since the complexes operate in areas controlled by ethnic groups, which, in turn, see no reason to halt activities that provide them with steady income. At each stage of the human trafficking process, these armed groups take a cut of the profits.

In recent years, decisive actions to close these complexes have been taken by the Thai authorities. In February 2025, they once again curtailed electricity supplies to several border towns, cut off telecommunications, and tightened banking and visa policies.

As a result, owners of scam factories released around 8,000 individuals. However, Thai authorities could not organize the swift return of these victims to their homes. While awaiting documentation, they were placed in temporary camps in Myanmar. The freed individuals reported scarce food supplies and poor sanitary conditions—sleeping areas were on the floor, and samples from the restrooms showed the presence of tuberculosis pathogens.

Thai authorities sometimes cannot recognize victims as victims of human trafficking; some are accused of violating immigration laws and sent to official detention centers.

Active steps are being taken by China, whose citizens make up the majority of the victims. Beijing has demanded that the authorities in Thailand and Myanmar grant senior police access to fraudulent complexes in the border area.

Thanks to strong connections with the political leadership of the self-proclaimed Wa State, China has managed to halt the expansion of centers in that area and liberate those held captive there.

Notably, similar scam complexes operate in Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, and the Philippines, but the presence of legitimate governments and relatively stable political conditions enable more effective combat against them.

Surrounding nations’ authorities are actively fighting against networks of fraudulent complexes that rob freedom from hundreds of thousands of people globally, but the struggle is complicated by the decentralized nature of the crime.

According to the latest data from UNODC, amid increased societal awareness and law enforcement opposition, criminal syndicates are extending their operations into the most remote, vulnerable, and unprepared parts of the region—and beyond.

The success of these groups is bolstered by laundering massive sums of illegal earnings through cryptocurrencies and underground banking systems, which subsequently enter banking systems worldwide.

They are growing increasingly powerful and influential, while law enforcement efforts currently only touch the tip of the iceberg.