That Call Center Tech Scammer Could Be a Human Trafficking Victim (theregister.com) 57
Human trafficking to staff cyber scam call centers, once isolated to Southeast Asia, has expanded beyond the region, according to an Interpol investigation revealing new evidence of abuse in South America and the Middle East. Previous hotspots since 2021 were Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar. From a report: The latest five-month operation discovered that victims from Malaysia were being trafficked to work in Peruvian call centers and Ugandan victims were being trafficked to Dubai for the same reason, only to be diverted to Thailand and then Myanmar. Police in Telangana, India, recently registered their first case of human trafficking for the purposes of cyber fraud. An accountant was lured to southeast Asia to work for a cyber fraud operation before eventually being returned in exchange for a ransom payment.
Interpol said that in Myanmar alone, it identified trafficking victims originating from at least 22 different countries, although most come from the country's Kayin and Shan states. Operation Storm Makers II has led to hundreds of arrests and the rescue of more than 140 individuals, although the scale of the threat is much larger; many of the 360 investigations remain open and ongoing. Fake job ads luring victims with promises of high pay for light work in IT, marketing, modeling, and other roles now utilize AI translation tools to target non-Chinese speakers, expanding the victim pool, according to the report.
Interpol said that in Myanmar alone, it identified trafficking victims originating from at least 22 different countries, although most come from the country's Kayin and Shan states. Operation Storm Makers II has led to hundreds of arrests and the rescue of more than 140 individuals, although the scale of the threat is much larger; many of the 360 investigations remain open and ongoing. Fake job ads luring victims with promises of high pay for light work in IT, marketing, modeling, and other roles now utilize AI translation tools to target non-Chinese speakers, expanding the victim pool, according to the report.
You don't expect me to pity a scammer. (Score:2, Insightful)
Right?
Re: You don't expect me to pity a scammer. (Score:1)
Re:You don't expect me to pity a scammer. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the point is that the actual scammers on the phone are doing it against their will.
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Exactly, some of them are being forced to do this work. See my post below.
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While that is undoubtedly true, in what way does that affect my response to the scam calls?
Does it make them less frequent? No.
Does it make them less annoying? No.
Does it make it less Illegal? No.
Does it mean they steal less (or more) money? No.
Does it mean I shouldn't just hang up without a word? No.
And even more important, can I do anything whatsoever about it? No.
So why, exactly, and in what way, do I care?
Re:You don't expect me to pity a scammer. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you don't care that someone is being held against their will, subjected to beatings and potentially sexual abuse, then why should anyone care about you?
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So, you have no idea what difference it makes either.
Good of you to admit it.
What have you done, personally, about it? Nothing?
That's right. Nothing . Virtue signaling doesn't count.
And neither do you.
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So, if you could, conceivably pity the person THEN WHAT?
Do you give them your data and allow yourself to be ripped off?
If so, I suggest you're a fool who DESERVES to be ripped off.
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While that is undoubtedly true, in what way does that affect my response to the scam calls?
None, except the caller themselves may not be ultimately responsible, so you may want to be cautious in how much abuse to send to them personally.
So why, exactly, and in what way, do I care?
Empathy?
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While that is undoubtedly true, in what way does that affect my response to the scam calls?
None, except the caller themselves may not be ultimately responsible, so you may want to be cautious in how much abuse to send to them personally.
If you consider hanging up on them without a word to be abuse, then, honestly, you belong in a home for the mentally insufficient.
Otherwise, since I made it clear that's my response in what you replied to, you're a lying sack of shit, only without the sack.
So why, exactly, and in what way, do I care?
Empathy?
Virtue signaling? Not worth my time.
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While that is undoubtedly true, in what way does that affect my response to the scam calls?
None, except the caller themselves may not be ultimately responsible, so you may want to be cautious in how much abuse to send to them personally.
If you consider hanging up on them without a word to be abuse, then, honestly, you belong in a home for the mentally insufficient.
Otherwise, since I made it clear that's my response in what you replied to, you're a lying sack of shit, only without the sack.
Hanging up without a word is perfectly fine. But many people do send quite a bit of vitriol at the caller.
And honestly, given your extra comment "you're a lying sack of shit, only without the sack" I expect that you occasionally (not always) have similar words for the scammers before you "hangup without a word".
So why, exactly, and in what way, do I care?
Empathy?
Virtue signaling? Not worth my time.
Virtue signalling is if you go around talking to people about how you feel for the human trafficked scammers. So yeah, you could accuse me of virtue signalling. Bu
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Hanging up without a word is perfectly fine.
Why'd you imply I have any other response when I said that's what I do.
But many people do send quite a bit of vitriol at the caller.
Why'd you imply I do?
And honestly, given your extra comment "you're a lying sack of shit, only without the sack" I expect that you occasionally (not always) have similar words for the scammers before you "hangup without a word".
Since you accused me of it before I called you out on your lying troll, you now look even more like a lying sack of shit.
Or are you claiming to be some sort of slave, forced at gunpoint to post your lying trolls here?
Virtue signalling is if you go around talking to people about how you feel for the human trafficked scammers. So yeah, you could accuse me of virtue signalling.
You've done, literally, nothing else.
But for you yourself to feel a little bit of empathy realizing the person calling you might be a victim? That's just plain virtue.
Do feel free to explain who my feeling empathy will have any effect whatsoever on these people. You know as well as I do the effect is zero. Neither they, not the sla
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Hanging up without a word is perfectly fine.
Why'd you imply I have any other response when I said that's what I do.
But many people do send quite a bit of vitriol at the caller.
Why'd you imply I do?
And honestly, given your extra comment "you're a lying sack of shit, only without the sack" I expect that you occasionally (not always) have similar words for the scammers before you "hangup without a word".
Since you accused me of it before I called you out on your lying troll, you now look even more like a lying sack of shit.
Or are you claiming to be some sort of slave, forced at gunpoint to post your lying trolls here?
Originally, I wasn't really trying to imply that you did go after the callers. Your comment was more of a general "what difference does it make/why should I care?". My point was mostly that a lot of people took it out on the callers who might not be the real villains and they may want to rethink their behaviour. Though given your general tone I also thought it not implausible that you might occasionally have an "FU" or something before you hung up so I left the wording a hair ambiguous.
If I was wrong I apol
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Hanging up without a word is perfectly fine. But many people do send quite a bit of vitriol at the caller.
And honestly, given your extra comment "you're a lying sack of shit, only without the sack" I expect that you occasionally (not always) have similar words for the scammers before you "hangup without a word".
It seems likely that when a person is a victim of human trafficking and possibly harsh physical abuse, hearing strong words from people they're being forced to defraud is the very least of their troubles. Let's not be such snowflakes.
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I did read the summary, yes. What am I supposed to do now? Pretend I fall for their scam so the poor, poor scammer doesn't get beaten up by the human trafficker? You're aware that making this profitable only subjects more people to this practice?
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I really wonder if that "Troll" mod is for you or DeSantis...
Seems harsh... (Score:2)
...but I'm wondering if prostitution wouldn't have been kinder.
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There were credible surveys years ago that indicated people would rather live next door to a child molester than a spammer.
I suspect this is similar.
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With good reason. If you have no kids, what's the worst that child molester would do to you?
That spammer, on the other hand....
Just block them already... (Score:5, Insightful)
Block all of the shitty voip providers allowing scammers to use their service. Fuck their legitimate customers, they should have considered that before routing scam calls to our phones and profiting from their lack of ethics.
No calls = no scams = no money = no reason to traffic people for call centers.
My logic is undeniable.
Re: Just block them already... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Block all of the shitty voip providers allowing scammers to use their service. Fuck their legitimate customers, they should have considered that before routing scam calls to our phones and profiting from their lack of ethics.
No calls = no scams = no money = no reason to traffic people for call centers.
My logic is undeniable.
Your theory is sound... it's the practical where you'll fail.
Many countries already do ban bulk calling from overseas centres. This means that they set up a PABX (Private Automatic Branch Exchange) connected to a physical line inside the countries borders, then run a VPN back to the 3rd world craphole of their choice (this is also what a lot of "legit" companies do with customer (dis)service). Again, there are laws against this but by the time the authorities have chased down the paper trail to find some
This gives me an entirely new idea (Score:4, Funny)
Next time someone asks who provides my electricity or tries to convince me I mailed in a post card this time last year asking about a vacation package I'm going to slowly start asking them if their manager touches them at night and if they remember who their daddy is.
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Hello sir, are you the homeowner?
Well, yes I am.
Who is your electricity provider?
Well, you see, I live in a van down by the river. I just got fill up at the local Conoco and get all the electricity from this here cigarette lighter plug.
Sir, have you considered going solar?
If I did that does it mean I don't have to the Conoco no-more?
Uhmm, what size is your home sir?
Well, it's a Ford E250 so it's about 19x8.
Uhmmmmm.... Sir...
I've actually had this conversation.
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Yes it happens (Score:5, Interesting)
My sister-in-law in Cambodia got caught up in a human trafficking trap after she answered an ad for translators (she speaks 4 languages).
She and her boyfriend were 'hired' and then bussed to Vietnam and then secretly to Myanmar where they were literally held captive and forced to do translations and phone scams. They didn't know where they were and they had their passports confiscated by the 'employer'. They were beaten if they didn't do the work and/or locked in a rat and feces-filled punishment room. My sister-in-law managed to get a message out to a friend on Facebook (!!), and it was relayed to Hun Sen's wife, who got the police from Cambodia and Myanmar involved.
To make a long story short, they were rescued, and the couple that was running the scam were arrested; the couple may be executed for their part in running a human trafficking ring (in fact, they might have already been executed, apparently Myanmar doesn't fuck around).
So yes, this shit does indeed happen, and it's happening right now, yesterday, today, and tomorrow. This incident with my SIL happened just a few months ago.
Re:Yes it happens (Score:5, Informative)
And just to be clear, the couple running the trafficking operation had 20 or more people literally enslaved, this wasn't just a couple of people they did this to.
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Probably something to do with the beatings, I'm guessing.
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My sister-in-law in Cambodia got caught up in a human trafficking trap after she answered an ad for translators (she speaks 4 languages).
I'm sorry to hear this. I hope she and her boyfriend are OK now.
She and her boyfriend were 'hired' and then bussed to Vietnam and then secretly to Myanmar where they were literally held captive and forced to do translations and phone scams.
I'm curious about this. It seems expensive and a hassle to ship people around. Why not just up a call center in an isolated corner of Cambodia? To make it harder for them to successfully escape? Or is it a scale issue (you'd rather have one large call center rather than many smaller ones)?
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1) Yes, they're okay, and back in Cambodia now.
2) That's a good question; I don't really know why. Maybe a smaller operation is easier to keep hidden, less chance of revolt...? I don't know. They had armed guards roaming around making sure no one tried to leave, so this was no joke. With any luck the owners have already had their heads removed.
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Myanmar has a pretty corrupt, brutal military dictatorship so I wouldn't be at all surprised.
Telcos and govt could fix this if they wanted to (Score:1)
The scam calls are out of control. It's not a complicated heuristic to determine which providers are generating millions of robocalls from spoofed caller ID and choke off their traffic.
US Telcos (Verizon, at&t, etc.) should cut off these sources. If they don't feds should crack down on the US telcos. Meanwhile the feds should demand that the major countries of origin for these calls clean house. 60 day notice; then USA cuts your company off from the US internet (and probably global internet by exten
Unintended consequence of making phone calls free (Score:3)
This entire robo/scam call problem wouldn't exist if it cause a nominal amount (say a nickel or even a penny) to ring any phone in the USA other than 911.
If it cost the scammers $50,000 to ring 1 million American phones, their scams could never be profitable.
I don't care who the $ would go to -- telco, govt, charity, or recipient of the call. But it would fix the problem.
Phone calls have fallen victim to the tragedy of the commons. When I was a kid, i was taught to respectfully answer the phone. Now when the phone rings, if I can't ID the caller as known, they're lucky if I grunt and give them 10 seconds to prove themselves legit.
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Re:Unintended consequence of making phone calls fr (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem would vastly shrink if the phone companies would require VOIP calls to use the correct country of origin, and disallowed pretend phone numbers designed to look like someone local. In small towns a lot of people answer the phone if it looks like a local number, it "might" be a friend. My mom (who is confused in many ways) seems to think any call from her area code to be legit but then avoids calls from other area codes (getting only half the lesson on "don't answer the phone").
Yes, everyone should be on the ball with security and should be able to recognize scams. But many elderly people are not. Even many younger people who aren't aware of such scams. The problem is just so much worse when the phone companies don't seem to care. Ie, some phone comapnies have a feature to tag "verified" numbers on caller id, and list some as "suspected scammer" or "unknown caller"; except that this is OFF by default and those likely to be the most susceptible to such scams won't know to turn it on or how to do it.
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One problem with that is that "correct country of origin" for an IP address is a non-trivial problem, because IP addresses are not tied to a location. Even if they were, it'd be easy enough for scammers to VPN their calls through a system in the target country.
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Yes.
But this is a Teleco to Teleco issue. For phone calls you could simply just stop accepting non verified numbers. Or implement a solution where on dial the called persons phone has to call back on the end information to verify a correct information.
Bluntly put: This is a very trivial problem.
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This entire robo/scam call problem wouldn't exist if it cause a nominal amount (say a nickel or even a penny) to ring any phone in the USA other than 911.
If it cost the scammers $50,000 to ring 1 million American phones, their scams could never be profitable.
I don't care who the $ would go to -- telco, govt, charity, or recipient of the call. But it would fix the problem.
Phone calls have fallen victim to the tragedy of the commons. When I was a kid, i was taught to respectfully answer the phone. Now when the phone rings, if I can't ID the caller as known, they're lucky if I grunt and give them 10 seconds to prove themselves legit.
It's already too expensive to do this kind of thing by IDD... Always been that way.
What has seen this kind of thing proliferate is setting up a local exchange, so the call originates from inside the country whilst it's connected via a VPN back end to another country.
I feel dirty now (Score:2)
They are lucky. (Score:2)
So the scammer got scammed (Score:2)