Dozens of Indonesians are still in Thailand, waiting to be repatriated after being freed from forced labor in Myanmar. Others who have already returned home say they were lured by false promises into working for online scamming operations which generate billions of dollars each year.
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00:00To some, they were scammers. To their bosses, they were no more than slaves.
00:07These 84 Indonesians are finally back in their home country after being forced to work for
00:11months as online scammers in Myanmar.
00:15One of them is Susie, not her real name. She spent six months in Myawaddy in a so-called
00:20scam park, a compound in which multiple fraud companies operate.
00:25Her ordeal began when she came across a job listing on Facebook advertising a customer
00:29service position at a logistics company supposedly in Thailand.
00:34A recruiter promised Susie that if the job wasn't as advertised, she would be brought
00:38back home. At the time, Susie felt reassured.
00:42But everything changed once she arrived at the compound, not in Thailand, but in Myanmar.
00:50When we got out of the car, there was a river below with a small boat waiting for us. We
00:54were escorted by soldiers. That's when I started thinking, what is this? Am I being
00:59sold? Am I going to be killed? Are they going to sell my organs? Those thoughts kept running
01:04through my mind.
01:07Inside this scam park, recruits were forced to run fraudulent investment schemes. They
01:12pretended to be attractive, successful individuals on social media, luring people into investing
01:17in a fake online business through a sham e-commerce website, like this.
01:23If scammers failed to generate US$10,000 per month, they were punished, beaten with
01:28metal objects or electrocuted. With guards everywhere and their passports confiscated
01:33by the company, escape seemed impossible.
01:40I was assigned to scam Indonesians. But I kept thinking, if I actually managed to trick
01:46someone, would I even be safe when I returned home? The truth always comes out. I decided
01:52I'd rather endure the punishments while looking for a way to escape Miawaddy.
02:02The scam park in Miawaddy is primarily run by Chinese gangs, using electricity and utilities
02:07from Thailand. Since February 5th, Thai authorities have cut off power, internet and fuel to the
02:14area, forcing some scam companies to cease operations and release the recruits, like
02:19the group of Indonesians who recently returned home.
02:22However, many of the hundreds of online scam operations in Miawaddy continue to thrive.
02:29According to Myanmar authorities, approximately 525 Indonesian citizens remain trapped in
02:35the scam park. Indonesian officials believe the actual number is much higher, as many
02:39victims remain undocumented.
02:44Our efforts must go beyond just rescuing and repatriating our citizens. The real challenge
02:51is enforcing the law and taking effective measures to prevent these crimes, including
02:57restricting the operations of these online scam syndicates.
03:05With Myanmar locked in an ongoing civil war, law enforcement is sporadic and ineffective.
03:11The scam syndicates continue to find ways to keep their operations running. Until stricter
03:16laws are in place and Myanmar authorities can enforce them, it is likely that more people
03:21will fall into the same trap.