San Francisco Frontiers - 'Modern slavery': Indonesians in clutches of scam syndicates

"When I arrived there, I was told to read a script," Budi, not his real name, told AFP on condition of anonymity. "It turned out that we were asked to work as scammers."

The 26-year-old was put to work 14 hours a day in a site ringed by barbed wire and patrolled by armed guards, he said. His days were punctuated by threats from his supervisors, and the nights were short. At the end of six weeks, he received just $390 of the $800 he was promised.

Thousands of Indonesians have been enticed abroad in recent years to other Southeast Asian countries for better-paying jobs, only to end up in the hands of transnational scam operators.

Many have been rescued and repatriated, but dozens still languish in scam compounds, forced to trawl social media sites and apps for victims.

Food stall worker Nanda, not her real name, said her husband flew to Thailand in mid-2022 after his employer went under, jumping at the chance to earn 20 million rupiah ($1,265) a month in an IT job recommended by a friend.

But after arriving in Bangkok, a Malaysian agent whisked him across the border with five others to the Myanmar town of Hpa Lu, where he was forced to work at an online scam compound.

The man was made to work shifts of more than 15 hours, facing punishments and verbal abuse for falling asleep on the job.

"He told me what he had experienced -- he was electrocuted, and also beaten -- but he didn't tell me in detail to stop me from thinking about it too much," said the 46-year-old.

She said her husband was sold and moved to another scamming operation earlier this year.

Like Budi, her husband was able to get word out about the conditions he was subjected to during the brief moments he was allowed to use his phone.

Phones are collected at the start of the work day, and call logs and messages screened by the scam operators.

But the furtive communications, sometimes in brief coded words, are often the only clues helping activist groups and authorities to locate the scam compounds for rescue operations.

- 'Very inhumane' -

Between 2020 and September this year, Jakarta repatriated more than 4,700 Indonesians entangled in online scam operations from countries including Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, according to foreign ministry data.

The government has identified at least 90 Indonesians still trapped in scam rings around Myanmar's Myawaddy area, said foreign ministry citizen protection director Judha Nugraha, adding the figure could be higher.

An Indonesian housewife whose husband remains trapped by a Myanmar online scamming syndicate said she has pleaded with officials to help but with little success.

"It's very inhumane, a job with the working condition of 16 to 20 hours, without pay... and always getting intimidation, punishment," said the 40-year-old housewife, who also requested anonymity.

Judha said, however, that Jakarta could only cooperate with local authorities and did not have the jurisdiction to carry out arrests abroad.

"There are various conditions... that will affect the speed of handling cases," he said, pointing to scam rings in Myawaddy where rescue and repatriation was further complicated by conflict in the region.

Cambodian authorities said they would crack down on such scam operators but also urged Indonesia and other countries to mount public awareness campaigns to inform citizens about the scams.

"Don't wait until there is a problem and point fingers at each other. That's not a solution at all," Chou Bun Eng, vice-chair of Cambodia's National Committee for Counter-Trafficking, told AFP.

The Cambodian government "won't let criminals work freely," she stressed.

"We won't let them (scam centres) spread," she added, saying that international cooperation is key to stopping the groups because "criminals are not ignorant -- they move from one place to another after committing criminal activities."

AFP was unable to reach a junta spokesman, or a spokesman for the Karen National Army, a military-aligned militia that controls territory around Hpa Lu -- close to Myawaddy, for comment.

- 'Modern slavery' -

United Nations officials have said those trapped by scam syndicates are experiencing a "living hell".

Victims have little option but to survive under duress, said Hanindha Kristy of NGO Beranda Migran, which regularly receives pleas for help from Indonesians tricked into scam rings.

"There is a modern slavery practice here, where they were recruited, tricked to work as scammers," she said.

Budi was able to escape after he was transferred to another scam ring in the Cambodian border town of Poipet.

While grateful for his escape, Budi, who is now working at a palm oil plantation, remains wracked by guilt over the fraud he had been forced to carry out.

"The guilt will be a lifelong feeling, because when we take away people's rightful belongings, it's like there's something stuck in my heart," he said.

V.Mitchell--SFF