Some online scam groups in Myanmar have moved to Cambodia
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on March 7 that all cyber scam centers in northern Myanmar near the Chinese border have been cleared. In addition, China, Myanmar and Thailand have recently cooperated to crack down on the cyber scam centers in Myawaddy. But in fact, many scammers knew there would be a crackdown and moved ahead of time.
So where did Myanmar's cyber scam groups move to?
What we know is, Some of them moved to Cambodia. Here are two recent examples:
Mondulkiri
According to Freshnews, the Cambodian National Police and the Mondulkiri Provincial Police raided the "Mekong 74" building in Sen Monorom City, seized an illegal cyber crime group, and detained 258 foreigners, including 247 Chinese, 9 Burmese, and 1 Malaysian and Vietnamese.
During the operation, the police targeted 14 suspects who were suspected of violent coercion of others to work, including 7 Chinese and 7 Burmese. The suspects were accused of forcing others to work by violent means. A Chinese victim was taken to the Mondulkiri Provincial Police Station for questioning due to coercion to assist in the investigation of the case.
The remaining 243 foreigners (239 Chinese, 2 Burmese, 1 Malaysian, and 1 Vietnamese) were transferred to the Immigration Department to await deportation.
According to public reports, the 14 arrested (7 Chinese and 7 Burmese) should be supervisors. This online scam group should be a group that moved from Myanmar to Mondulkiri, Cambodia. The main staff are Chinese, and they target Chinese people for scamming.
Bokor Mountain
On March 5, the Chinese WeChat Official Account "A Long's Adventure" published an article "A large fraud gang is hidden on Bokor Mountain in Cambodia", revealing one of the locations where the northern Myanmar online scam groups moved: Bokor Mountain in Cambodia.
Although Liu Zhengxiang, the leader of the Kokang Liu family, one of the "Four Major Families" in Kokang, northern Myanmar, has been arrested, his son Liu Jiguang is still at large. Liu Jiguang is the chairman of "Gobo East". Gobo East entered Cambodia in 2017, and the Gobo East Casino in Sihanoukville officially opened in 2018. Due to the crackdown in northern Myanmar, the original Gobo East Casino in Sihanoukville has been renamed "Baolong casino".
According to the article, the Liu family has Royal Lihua Casino in Dongcheng, Kokang, and Royal Lihua Casino in Sihanoukville. The person who cooperated with Liu Jiguang in Sihanoukville was a Chinese from Qujing, Yunnan named Wu Yanbing. The person in charge of Royal Lihua's finances was Zhang Meiyu from Qujing. Both Wu Yanbing and Zhang Meiyu have been wanted.
Because Sihanoukville became a big target known for the online scam business, they moved to Bokor Mountain in Kampot, and cooperated with the Sokha Group to open the Sokha Lihua Casino and the online scam center.
The online scam compounds in Bokor Mountain has been raided several times by the joint law enforcement of China and Cambodia, but it has now recovered and is very prosperous.
At present, the original text published by "A Long's Adventure" has been deleted, but other websites still have traces of the reprint. Many casinos and online gambling center owners in Cambodia are afraid that their criminal acts will be made public. When they encounter relevant reports, they often pay to delete posts.
And there is another post talking about the Sokor Lihua scam center in Bokor.
A man was scammed by his old schoolmate, after paying $2,225 to help him escape from Sokor Lihua scam center in Bokor Mountain. The schoolmate claimed he was trapped in a scam company for five years, earning nothing despite generating millions. He convinced his friend to transfer the money for "compensation fees",but then disappeared.
Falling from a building, kidnapping and murder
Recently, there have been many falling from a building, kidnapping and murder cases in Cambodia. There are also traces of kidnapping gangs behind the murders, and falling from a building is mostly related to online scam centers.
5 falling case from buildings
Recently, there have been many falling from a building in Cambodia:
On the morning of March 8, a falling from a building occurred in the Skyline, Phnom Penh, and a foreign man died on the spot. Skyline has had many falling cases. One resident said that he had lived here for 5 years and a total of 7 people had fallen from that building.
At noon on March 5, someone fell from the 18th floor of the Nanhai Building in Sihanoukville, and the person who fell from the building died on the spot. There have also been many falling cases in Nanhai Building. This falling case has been reported by many Chinese news channels, but many of them have been deleted.
On the evening of March 1, a Chinese man fell from a building in Jinbei 4 compound in Sihanoukville and was seriously injured.
On the morning of February 14, a Chinese man fell from a high-rise building in Jinbei 6 compound in Sihanoukville and died on the spot.
On the evening of February 14, another Chinese man fell from a building in Jinsha Huawei casino in Sihanoukville and died.
Kidnapping case: Australian Chinese businessman was kidnapped and jumped out of a car to escape in Cambodia
On the afternoon of March 3, a Chinese man suddenly jumped out of a red car driving at high speed and escaped. The video was posted on social networks.
Cambodian police confirmed that the case was a kidnapping and extortion case. The victim was Liu Sen, a 38-year-old Australian Chinese businessman. He contacted Feng Zhiye, a Chinese businessman in Cambodia, to invest and do business.
He left Australia on the evening of March 2 and got in the car driven by a Cambodian driver sent by Feng Zhiye after arriving at Phnom Penh Airport on the morning of March 3. But when the car drove to the Third Ring Road, another three Cambodians came and controlled him. He resisted and jumped out of the car window to escape.
Currently, the local driver Chea Wutthy has been arrested, and other suspects are on the run.
A kidnapping case behind a murder
On the evening of February 27, 18-year-old Cambodian woman Heng Seavly was killed and buried in a wasteland near AEON 3 in Phnom Penh. On March 1, the police found the body of the deceased and arrested her Chinese boyfriend Chen Cong and another suspect Li Haohao. Then on March 5, the police arrested the mastermind Yang Kaixin who fled to Vietnam.
Heng Seavly previously worked with her boyfriend Chen Cong in a Sihanoukville online scam company. Not long ago in February, the company moved from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh, and they had just arrived in Phnom Penh.
It is understood that the kidnappers had kidnapped Chen Cong, imprisoned him and extorted money, and then asked Chen Cong to join their kidnapping gang, otherwise they would not let him go, and Chen Cong joined. But the kidnappers were worried about Heng Seavly, afraid that he would reveal their secrets, and decided to kill her to silence her.
The murderer stripped her clothes before burying the body, in order to accelerate the decay of the body and make it difficult to identify the identity of the deceased.
After the incident, many locals said on Facebook that this is the fate of finding a Chinese boyfriend. In fact, with the widespread existence of the cybercrime industry in Cambodia, many Cambodian locals have realized the huge profits brought by the cybercrime industry. Some have joined this industry and engaged in translation and other jobs. Some young women have found Chinese boyfriends who work in the cybercrime industry because these boyfriends can give them much more money than their peers and improve their economic situation.
When the online scam group was in Myanmar, many Burmese Chinese women became boyfriends and girlfriends with Chinese online gambling or scam staff. The same situation is also true in Cambodia.
The tragedy of Heng Seavly and Chen Cong is just one example.