The rise of scam centres 2.0 in Myanmar's war zone

The scam industry in Myanmar is morphing and heading into the jungle, according to satellite imagery, victim testimony and local investigators.Deep in Myanmar's borderlands, pro-democracy fighters from an ethnic Karen armed group made an unexpected discovery after retaking territory held by a militia.The Karen National Liberation Army entered a large apartment complex behind jungle and razor wire fences.Inside, they found one of the country's largest online scamming operations.About 3,000 people were working in the compound."When we started to hear their stories, I realised just how plain evil the treatment of workers was in there," said Cameron, a pseudonym used for security reasons as he continues working inside Myanmar.He works for the Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian organisation that provided medical assistance for the newly freed victims."Some were out in the cold, all freezing and vulnerable near the river." Karen National Liberation Army soldiers walk though Shunda Park.(Supplied: Free Burma Rangers)The compound, known as Shunda Park, was a hub of industrial-scale cyber fraud."When we didn't hit the targets of scamming enough people, we were hung by chains and kept in dark rooms," recalled Ivan, a Malaysian man who was trafficked through Thailand to Myanmar and freed during the operation.Other workers described similar experiences to Ivan: held in dark rooms for days with little food or water for punishment.Photos were shared with the ABC showing bruises and other injuries that had been inflicted.During the discovery, troops recovered thousands of phones, SIM cards and hard drives, alongside training manuals that instructed workers how to run romance scams. Scam compounds often look like mundane office buildings.(Supplied: Free Burma Rangers) Thousands of sim cards and phones seized after Shunda Park was liberated.(Supplied: Free Burma Rangers)The capture of Shunda Park offered a rare glimpse inside an industry that has flourished in the chaos of Myanmar's civil war.Since the military seized power in a 2021 coup, scam compounds have proliferated across the country's lawless border regions, generating millions of dollars while exploiting trafficked workers from around the world.The ABC heard from two people, Ivan from Malaysia and a man from Taiwan, who were trafficked into compounds in the mountains of Myanmar's Karen State.They asked to remain anonymous for fear of their safety or being targeted online.Scam industry growing in Myanmar, despite crackdownsThailand and the Myanmar military have publicised their dismantling of scam centres, including two sprawling compounds that were far larger than Shunda Park.Shwe Kokko and KK Park, two notorious operations, held thousands of workers when they were raided last year.Up to 25,000 scammers worked in KK Park alone before it was spectacularly bombed.Thai anti-trafficking officials warned the true number of people held in the compound could have been higher.But investigators say the industry is decentralising rather than shutting down."The problem isn't disappearing, it's morphing," said Jason Tower, a senior analyst with the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime.Free Burma Rangers confirmed a similar pattern on the ground."We saw multiple probable scam compounds under construction on the way to Shunda Park," Cameron said.Nathan Ruser, an Australian Strategic Policy Institute analyst who monitors the compounds through satellite imagery, said new facilities were visibly under construction even as authorities talked of crackdowns elsewhere."The growth of these centres is [following] an exponential curve," he said.Many of the newer compounds look like apartments.They're springing up along the border with Thailand; many are within minutes' drive of each other.Mr Tower said there was evidence of a new model built to evade detection."Scamming 2.0 is effectively compounds no longer within view from the Thai border, but operating deeper inside Myanmar," he told the ABC.Satellite imagery suggests that one of the newer compounds, called Tai Chang, sprung up in 2024.Human rights groups have received calls for help from victims inside Tai Chang that confirm tactics far more brutal than previous compounds are being used to pressure workers."They are further away so they're heavily reliant on trafficking victims," said Mr Ruser, referring to the lack of workers living nearby the compounds."There's a lot more torture … a lot less medical care."There's less infrastructure [in the smaller locations]", he said, pointing to compounds popping up along the Moei River in southern Myanmar, further away from the border crossing between Thailand and Myanmar.What's more, investigators say the large compounds such as KK Park have undergone what anti-trafficking expert Mechelle Moore from Global Alms described as "performative demolition".Buildings visible from main roads appear damaged or abandoned, while many operations continue or shift elsewhere."The crime syndicates were given a heads up … they left early before the raids started," said an anti-trafficking investigator who tracks scam compounds along the border."We actually confirmed KK Park and others around it are still very much standing and operational," she said.Up and down the Thai border, scam centres continue to operate. To the south, they are spreading into more rural areas.When one compound was shut down, said Mr Ruser, another was likely to spring up elsewhere."Scam centres require only a small footprint: a rented hotel, computers, electricity, an internet connection and permissive local law enforcement."That makes it almost impossible to stamp out comprehensively across the region."Who are the scammers?Many of the people carrying out the scams are themselves victims.Lin, a Taiwanese man, said he was lured to Bangkok with the promise of a translation job before being trafficked across the border into Myanmar.Scammers were told to conduct "pig butchering", which involves building fake online profiles and cultivating relationships before persuading people to hand over large sums, often through cryptocurrency.Freed victims said they were primarily targeting Americans on social media, but they also went after Australians. A tent encampment on the edge of the Moei River, near Shunda Park.(Supplied: Free Burma Rangers)"I was targeting Australian women," a liberated Ethiopian man later told British news.He added, "Mostly the good clients are the older women because they are desperate for love."When Lin attempted to contact Taiwanese police and email his location in a plea for help, he said he was brutally punished."I was confined to a cage and forced to stand handcuffed in the sun for hours each day," Lin wrote in an email to several NGOs asking for help.He shared photographs showing bruises across his body and said repeated beatings left him with suspected fractured ribs."I could hear my bones grinding together when I walked and breathed," he said.Inside Shunda Park, success and failure were mapped into the building itself.Workers who generated high revenue were housed on the upper floors, says Cameron of Free Burma Rangers.On lower levels, those who failed were put in punishment rooms: isolation boxes with wi-fi access, where detainees could earn their release by resuming online scam work.The disparity was visible throughout the compound.There were recreational facilities, including a karaoke bar for the Chinese bosses to enjoy.According to Ivan, who was interned at Shunda Park, guards carried rubber-coated batons designed to inflict intense pain without leaving obvious injuries or breaking the skin.Ivan said he often wrote down false phone numbers when bosses asked for progress reports.At least 120,000 people are thought to be trapped in scam compounds in Myanmar, according to estimates by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.Shutting down the scamming industryScam compounds have flourished along the border since the Myanmar military coup five years ago, where militia-controlled territory has enabled the abduction and movement of workers across the region.The region has long attracted criminal networks due to its cross-border supply access for fuel and established illicit infrastructure of the first scam compounds in Myanmar. The Karen National Liberation Army wants to shut down compounds and stop the industry from growing.(Supplied: Free Burma Rangers)As international sanctions and isolation have squeezed Myanmar's military rulers, experts say the junta and its allies have become increasingly reliant on revenue from scamming.Many scam centres operate under the protection of local militias, or groups aligned with the Myanmar military, which the UN has repeatedly accused of committing widespread atrocities and war crimes against its own citizens.The capture of Shunda Park demonstrated scam compounds were not beyond reach.It also provided intelligence that was shared with international partners.The FBI sent personnel to work alongside Thai authorities examining thousands of mobile phones and hard drives recovered from the compound and interviewing former workers.Investigators identified the Chinese operators behind the site and helped build a case against the two alleged ringleaders.One, Huang Xingshan, allegedly served as a manager and enforcer who personally participated in the punishment of trafficked workers.The other, Jiang Wen Jie, allegedly supervised teams targeting American victims.Prosecutors say one worker under his command defrauded a single victim of more than $US3 million ($4.35 million) through a fake investment platform.Both men were later arrested in Thailand while allegedly attempting to travel from Cambodia back into Myanmar.The ABC sought comment from Thai authorities but did not receive a response.The Myanmar military was unable to be contacted.Shunda embedded in sprawling criminal ecosystemFunds stolen by criminal groups based in South-East Asia likely exceed $US43.8 billion ($63.5 billion) a year, nearly 40 per cent of the combined formal GDP of Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar, according to the US Institute of Peace.The raid on Shunda Park also challenged assumptions about who is willing and able to confront the scam economy.Some experts argue the Karen National Union (KNU), the political arm of the resistance group fighting Myanmar's military in Karen state, is one of few actors with both the political will and local knowledge to disrupt scam operations. Bosses of scamming compounds live in luxury on top floors while scammers work below them.(Supplied: Free Burma Rangers)Other armed groups, militias and the Myanmar military, have become financially dependent on the illicit economy surrounding online fraud.Shunda Park, Tai Chang and a growing number of new scam compounds are in territory occupied by the Myanmar junta-aligned militia known as the Democratic Karen Benevolent Army (DKBA)."I have been saying this for many years: we need someone on the ground to work with," Mr Tower said."The KNU are really the only group in that area with the political will to do something about these issues."If we don't find an actor on the ground interested in the Karen people, and interested in responsible governance on the ground and really get in there, then we aren't going to have tools to stop these scams," Mr Tower added.Thailand has periodically cut electricity, internet and fuel supplies to border compounds, temporarily disrupting operations.But investigators say scam operators have adapted and are increasingly relying on satellite internet services such as Starlink.Mr Tower describes the emergence of "scam centres 3.0": mobile operations concealed in jungle territory across the country, far from border towns and difficult to monitor.Unlike the vast complexes that came to symbolise South-East Asia's scam industry, these new sites can be rapidly assembled using temporary structures, portable perimeter walls, generators and satellite internet, then dismantled just as quickly if authorities close in."It's almost like a humanitarian field operation," Mr Tower said, "except it's built for scamming."If pressure mounts in one area, operators can simply relocate.The KNU has called for international cooperation for eradicating scam compounds.But with civil war continuing, and no functioning national government capable of asserting control, the risk remains high for anyone trying to clamp down on the compounds.Artillery and drone strikes continue nearby the compounds.Experts believe the Myanmar military is determined to retake areas seized by resistance groups.Not only because of its strategic value, but because the compounds themselves have become woven into the wartime economy.For the thousands trafficked into them each year, the distinction matters little.About the dataScam compounds identified by ASPI's Nathan Ruser, using Sentinel-2 Satellite imagery from 2020 to 2026 (taken in April and May each year).For each of the compounds, the built-up area was mapped, defined by areas where individual buildings could be discerned from the 10m-resolution satellite imagery.Suspected construction areas in 2026 were mapped separately, where there has been evidence of construction either around existing facilities or entirely new areas under construction but not advanced enough to determine whether they are certainly scam centres or potentially something else.CreditsReporting: Libby HoganGraphics: Jarrod FankhauserDigital production: Julian FellEditing: Ian Burrows and Cristen TilleyPosted Tue 21 Jul 2026 at 3:21pmTue 21 Jul 2026 at 3:21pm