The investigative TV series Frontline that broadcasts on PBS has released a new documentary on the way that internet scams have exploded in recent years. It is now estimated to have swindled billions of dollars from people all over the world. The major scamming operations are huge with the people behind them creating small cities in the remote jungles of Cambodia and Myanmar where they build massive compounds that house ten of thousands of workers in barracks-like conditions to carry out the frauds.
These workers from all over Asia have been tricked into thinking that they were being hired to work in legitimate jobs, usually in the hospitality industry, but and upon arriving find their passports taken and made to work under horrendous conditions. They are given highly detailed fake profiles and scripts to follow when they contact a target victim, so that they can be induced into parting with their money. The workers often do not speak English but they work off scripts in their own language which are then translated into English. They are severely punished with beatings if they do not perform to expectations. The governments of Cambodia and Myanmar seem to turn a blind eye to these abuses unless there is a global outcry upon which they raid some facilities, release the prisoners, and destroy the compound. But the criminals then simply move to a different location and build new small cities within a short time, usually a couple of months.
I have blogged about these so-called ‘pig-butchering’ scams before, but this documentary (which is available for free) shows in much greater detail how the scam works and the impact it has on people who have sometimes lost hundreds and thousands of dollars. In one of those posts, I described the detailed system the scammers use.
The victims often have some wealth because scammers do not want to waste time with people who have little disposable income. They are often older people who are less internet savvy. Some are lonely and thus susceptible to online romances and are reached through dating services that they subscribed to. But some are professionals like doctors lawyers and tech workers who are computer-savvy and quite wealthy but are lured by the promise of making more money quickly. After trust is built up, the scammer, who often pretends otherwise be immensely wealthy and provides photographs to ‘prove’ it, says that they can help the victim become more wealthy too and are induced to open an account and ‘invest’ money in some operation, sometimes up to a million dollars. The victims often observe their portfolio increasing in value quite rapidly but when they try to withdraw any money, they find that they are expected to pay an escalating series of ‘fees’ tand after a while the account is blocked or disappears. It is very difficult to recover the money because these accounts are in cryptocurrency and money is thus easily laundered. Many victims do not tell law enforcement or even their family members about this because they are so embarrassed at how gullible they were.
But now with AI, you do not have to be part of a big scamming operation. In addition to these industrial-scale operations, the documentary also looked at small-scale operations that consist of young men (some in Nigeria) who learn from their friends how to create false personas (usually as attractive young women) on social media and contact young people and begin online flirtations. At some point they ask the victim to send them sexually explicit photographs and once they do, they start blackmailing them, threatening them with humiliating exposure if they do not pay them money. The sums involved in these scams are not that large (the victims are often teenagers who do not have much money) but not insignificant for these scammers and is usually more than the victim has, and the shame and fear of exposure leads some to take their own lives.
The documentary interviews people who used to work for social media sites like Facebook and Instagram who say that these massive companies with all their resources are much more sophisticated and powerful than the scammers and have the tools to crack down on these frauds by putting in measures to prevent scammers from creating fake accounts and shutting down fraudulent ones. But they pretend they are helpless to do much because their business models (and stock prices) depend on having more and more people signing up and spending time on the sites. So they do little other than give lip service to reforms because they fear that any real action to weed out bad actors will put the brakes on their growth.
Another potential chokepoint that is not being utilized is the internet. Scammers need access to it and these scam operations in the jungles of Cambodia and Myanmar use Elon Musk’s Starlink to access it. Starlink can identify each individual site that they connect to and know their GPS locations. Internet sleuths using satellite imagery can identify the GPS locations of these scam cities and Starlink could turn off access to those sites if they wanted to but they don’t.
Another chokepoint are the cryptocurrency companies and the exchanges where real money is exchanged back and forth with crypto. But those companies also drag their feet when it comes to freezing the assets of scammers and shutting down their accounts.
So the greed of the big tech companies, along with the increasing use of AI, is resulting in these scams becoming an epidemic.
Video is not available in my country, Mano. Is there another link?
I have special interest in this Frontline video, because my elder son is entrapped in a “celebrity romance scam.”
As far as I can tell, it begin when he attended a metal band performance and chose to donate some money to a cause they were supporting. Soon after, he was contacted by one of the “female performers”, and he has been in constant communication, through texting, ever since.
Since “meeting“ her, he has quit his lucrative IT job and divorced his wife. Many of his friends have given up listening to his nonsense.
There is no doubt that he is being psychologically manipulated by real professionals who have identified those needs in his life they are not being met.
It is a never-ending roller coaster of high expectations, followed by dashed hopes and broken promises (and some tears).
There is a whole cascade of characters in this mini drama to include the performer’s parents, the band manager, the band’s record label, and the performer’s sisters, (who are also in the band). I expect that they are all the same person, just with different phone numbers or email addresses.
I’ve pushed him to try hard to contact at least a couple of these “characters“ using legitimate contact information, and both times, he gets no response (but of course he gets instant response when he contacts the same people through the numbers that the fake performer has given him).
He’s been asked to pay for “ a non-disclosure agreement that identifies him as her official boyfriend,“ “a VIP pass that gets him lifetime access to all of the band’s
performances,“ “enough money to buy out and release her from her record label contract so she can be with him,“ “money for airfare, housing and food when he joins the band as a roadie/lover on a European tour“ etc, etc…The only thing that is uncertain is exactly how much money he has lost, because he isn’t saying, but he admitted to one person that it’s at least $100,000 (but more likely multiples of that).
To my knowledge, he’s sat at the airport waiting for her three times.
He’s driven eight hours to a performance, only to be turned away, because “the band manager has learned of the plan to pay off the performer’s contract, security has been alerted and will not allow him to be admitted.“ He has sat in the audience of a different performance with a fairly small attendance of 5000 fans and she could neither acknowledge him nor meet with him, because she was “ being controlled by her manager” and it was somehow “forbidden.” (He took solace that she seemed somewhat depressed during the performance because they could not meet).
I have spoken to the FBI and to the AARP scam hotline.
For nearly a year, my son and I spoke weekly on the phone for an hour and a half, talking about this and that, but always ending, on my insistence, with a discussion of how none of this was real. I’ve shared with him the very obvious pattern, that whatever only the real performer could provide ( primarily, a face-to-face meeting) has never happened, while everything that a scammer could promise, (and then never fulfill), has happened multiple times.
I’ve tried to educate him about the techno tricks that have been used to help make him think that this is real, but to no avail (in reality, he’s pretty easy, because as far as I know, the scammers have only had to resort to a video meeting once, and though he doesn’t like it, he reluctantly accepts multiple texting exchanges per day).
He has seen the YouTube video where the performers in the band have said clearly that they do not interact with their fans privately and that there are scammers impersonating them (but that of course does not apply to him).
Recently I chose to push harder, because I wasn’t making any progress with a rational and gentle approach (and I was concerned that I was actually somehow enabling him). I now join the list of those people who have similarly told him the truth and are no longer welcome to contact him.
Did I mention that the performer is beautiful, half his age, and he is approaching 50 years old?
I’ve gotten quite an education…
tonykehoe @#1,
I am not an expert on this but I think that each country has its own rules that limit access.
One option is to set up a VPN account that enables your site to be diverted through any other country, so it looks like you are in the US.
A simpler option that does not always work is to search on YouTube with key words related to the sketch (SNL, Jalen Brunson, crew, Young Rell, etc.) and see if it throws up s different link that you can see.
Considering the systemic damage they do to societal trust, I am in favor of making a list of these scammers and giving their names and adresses to serial killers.
@2 butterflyguy
Apologies for bluntness, but your son doesn’t sound like the sharpest tool in the shed.
He’s loaded with cash, though. For now.
@beholder #5:
That’s really unkind. I loathe the insinuation that the son deserves all that’s happening because he’s too foolish to see reason. Is your suggestion that beholder should just wash their hands of their son? Are all your own perfect relatives perfect, or have you disowned them already?
@butterflyguy #2:
It’s horrible to see someone caught up in a trap that they refuse to wise up to. I believe it to be a version of the sunk cost fallacy that turns the original hope and euphoria into dogged resistance to admitting that all of the time, money, effort and emotional investment has been for nothing. Your son can either admit what he’s thrown away, or hang on to the hope that, against all reason, it just might be true.
But knowing this doesn’t help you. I have no suggestions as to what you can try that you haven’t already.
re: file thirteen #6:
I agree with you that impugning the victim’s intelligence is unkind. Sunk cost fallacy, bias -- hard to tell why people can be so blind about being connect.
“I have no suggestions as to what you can try that you haven’t already.”
My suggestion would be to name some names. It is likely that many others have been similarly scammed by this person/these people, perhaps outing them would help.
butterflyguy @#2,
I am so sorry to hear of your son’s plight.
We must never forget that these scammers are expert at what they do and their victims are usually very naive, so it is an unequal match. As some of the other commenters have pointed out, once you have given up some money, even if it is small amount, it is very hard to admit that you’ve been scammed and cut your losses. Hope always springs eternal that you might be vindicated. I hope that your son comes to a realization soon.
When we read a summary like yours, events are so compressed that the scam seems obvious and we may be tempted to think that the victim must be foolish for falling for it but such a judgment is not warranted. For example, at the moment, I think that I am in the middle of being catfished. I was approached online for some advice which I was willing to give but had the suspicion that it was the prelude to a scam because the person continued the interaction even after I had said what I had to say. I am increasingly sure that it is a scam but marvel at how skillfully they are leading up to it. They play the long game so it is not surprising that over time people can let their guard drop.
If I had not already been alert to the existence of such things, who knows, I may have fallen for it too.
@6 file thirteen
It’s not nearly as unkind as what his ex-wife, all of his former friends, and several of his family members have already said to him, I’m willing to bet.
I’m not saying people are perfect and never fall for scams. I’m not saying he deserves it. This guy’s midlife crisis hit him like a truck and he’s feeling lonely — much smarter people feel that way too. One round of “high expectations, followed by dashed hopes and broken promises (and some tears)” is what I expect from a smart person. No, this guy is stuck in a loop, and the scammers know all his levers. I feel sorry for him.
Keep the FBI on hand, though. He’s already stalking the bandmembers and unless he’s cooled down by some serious professionals, he will probably lash out and try to injure or kill the real “female performer” when this scam falls apart in spectacular fashion.
@beholder #9:
I meant unkind to butterflyguy. It’s the loved ones of the scammed that I really feel sorry for.
Wow. First the scammed guy is a moron, and now he’s a dangerous time-bomb. Kinda makes the words of sympathy ring hollow.