WATCHED closely by armed guards, a man posing online as a woman threatens to expose the nude selfies of a teenage boy unless the youngster transfers £1,000 to him.
Just feet away from the man, another cyber scammer steals the life savings of a British widower after spending weeks love-bombing the pensioner in a sick ‘pig butchering’ plot.
SuppliedElijah Heacock took his own life after being targeted with a deep fake image[/caption]
InterpolTrafficked workers are packed into crowded call centres and forced into committing scams[/caption]
International Justice MissionGavesh was trafficked after applying for a job in Thailand[/caption]
The workers’ actions are heinous – and potentially deadly, with both adults and children worldwide killing themselves over devastating cryptocurrency and sextortion schemes.
Yet, unbeknown to those they ruthlessly target, these scammers may be victims, too.
Trafficked to scam compounds, brazenly operated near holiday hotspots in Southeast Asia, countless workers are being forced to deceive Brits out of millions, if not billions, of pounds.
If they refuse to do so, they face being electrocuted, force-fed guards’ urine, raped, locked inside dark rooms for days, tied up in water-filled pits, or even butchered for their organs.
“I made foreigners fall in love with me… but it was all lies,” admits one former scammer, Gavesh*, who was forced to follow a ‘script’ or face horrific methods of punishment.
He tells The Sun: “One of our colleagues was sent to ‘water jail’ for punishment. The colleague returned to the office beaten to the point that he could hardly talk or walk.”
Crime gang bosses are callously profiting from the torture of such workers, with Brits losing £11.4billion to scams last year, according to the Global Anti-Scam Alliance (GASA).
The shocking figure, a rise of £4billion on the year before, comes as new research suggests that trafficking victims at Southeast Asia’s scam compounds are now sextorting children.
Cyber scammers appear to have branched out and are now tricking kids into sending explicit images of themselves, which are then used to extort cash from them, a study by the anti-slavery charity, International Justice Mission (IJM), reveals.
Such extortion can be fatal: just last month, a grieving mum told The Sun how her teenage son, Elijah Heacock, had taken his own life after being blackmailed over a deepfake nude.
SuppliedElijah was traumatised after being sent a deep fake picture and blackmail threats[/caption]
Elijah with mum Shannon, dad John and twin sister PalinSupplied
ITVSextortion victim Murray Dowey took his own life in December 2023[/caption]
“I remember seeing the picture, and I thought, ‘What is that? That’s weird. That’s like a picture of my child, but that’s not my child’,” said Elijah’s mum Shannon, from Kentucky, US.
The deepfake of ‘Elijah’ is thought to have been created by an international blackmailer.
“The photo almost looked like somebody sitting in a cloud,” added Shannon.
“He had abs. Eli did not have abs – bless his heart, he thought he did.”
In Britain, 16-year-old Murray Dowey took his own life in 2023 after becoming a victim of sextortion. The teen had been blackmailed by anonymous scammers posing as a young girl.
And child sexual extortion cases are soaring in the UK, with reports having risen by 72 per cent in a year, according to data released this month by the Internet Watch Foundation and Childline.
“Criminal gangs have now realised that even more money can be made by involving children,” says UK criminal defence lawyer Marcus Johnstone, of PCD Solicitors.
He adds: “As a solicitor specialising in sexual offences, I have seen an exponential growth in online sex crimes involving children.”
Beaten and electrocuted
Among the factory-like scam compounds now linked to child sextortion are sites in beach-lined Cambodia, mountainous Laos, and the war-torn country of Myanmar.
In Myanmar, which borders Thailand, the United Nations (UN) estimates that at least 120,000 people have been forced to carry out “lucrative” online scams.
“People who are coerced into working in these scamming operations endure inhumane treatment while being forced to carry out crimes,” said UN rights chief Volker Türk.
“They are victims. They are not criminals.”
Among those trafficked to Myanmar – where Chinese crime networks are known to operate scam compounds, with armed groups reportedly supporting their crimes – was Gavesh.
Now aged 30, he was struggling financially in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic when he spotted an “enticing” job advert on social media to be a data entry operator in Thailand.
“ They promised me $1,000 (£740) a month,” Gavesh recalls.
AFPScam workers discovered in a recent crackdown by border forces in Myanmar[/caption]
International Justice MissionA notorious scam compound in Myanmar[/caption]
International Justice MissionJun Hao applied for a job in Cambodia but was forced to work in[/caption]
Thrilled to be hired, Gavesh travelled to Bangkok, then to Mae Sot, in western Thailand. But once there, a gang of men forced him into a boat and took him to Myanmar against his will.
“I thought the job in Thailand would be the answer to my dream – provide a better life for my father and siblings. But it turned out to be a nightmare,” says Gavesh.
Taken to a scam compound and relieved of his phone and passport, Gavesh felt terrified.
He was soon forced to scam strangers up to 16 hours a day, seven days a week. If he showed signs of tiredness, or failed to keep his legs parallel, he was told he’d be punished.
“The place was like a prison,” Gavesh says, adding that his co-workers came from India, the Philippines, Pakistan, China, Indonesia, Ukraine, Russia, Japan, and elsewhere.
“The work at the compound was brutal and harrowing. The main job was to steal money from people around the world through cryptocurrency scams.”
He adds: “I felt disgusted by scamming people but was left with no choice and was scared for my life… there was no way of escaping that place.
“The compounds had walls 10 feet high, with wires on top. The place was highly guarded by armed men. Any attempt to escape the compound is a death wish.”
Another former scammer, Jun Hao*, echoes Gavesh’s claims of brutality.
Like Gavesh, Jun responded to an online job advert – this one, for a role in customer service in Cambodia. In reality, the ‘job’ involved conducting twisted ‘pig butchering’ scams.
I was shocked and scared. The boss punished the people in front of us…they were using an electric baton to shock people until they fell down.”
Jun Hao
These schemes see the victim treated like a ‘pig’ fattened up for slaughter: the scammer lures them in, love-bombs them, then convinces them to invest in a fake crypto platform.
“If I didn’t hit the target, I knew the boss would beat me,” says Jun, revealing that if a worker was caught yawning three times in a day, they had $50 docked from their pay.
He adds: “I was shocked and scared. The boss punished the people in front of us…they were using an electric baton to shock people until they fell down.”
If a scammer was deemed not valuable enough, or too troublesome, they were trafficked to a different compound. Gavesh was sold to crime bosses in Myanmar three times.
In Cambodia, Jun says he heard that this cycle of buying and selling humans would repeat until the scammer was either trafficked on the black market for their organs, or killed.
For some workers, the risk of attempting escape was worth it.
“One guy jumped out from the fifth floor,” says Jun. “Even with broken legs, he got up and escaped.”
AFPA raid by Karen Border Guard Force (BGF) in Myanmar’s eastern Myawaddy township found hundreds of foreign workers in the KK Park compound[/caption]
A fake advert on Facebook lures unwitting trafficking victims in
InterpolExhausted workers are forced to scam for 16 hours a day[/caption]
Raped and forced to drink urine
Jun also eventually achieved freedom after secretly – and bravely – contacting IJM online.
And the charity helped Gavesh after he managed to financially negotiate his way out of slavery – a moment he describes as “the most beautiful thing that happened to me”.
Yet scam compounds remain a multi-billion-pound criminal industry, with governments in Southeast Asia unable to control them and gangs spreading into new territory.
In June, INTERPOL revealed that these ‘businesses’ have expanded their global footprint.
“As of March 2025, victims from 66 countries were trafficked into online scam centres, with no continent left untouched,” said the international organisation.
In one INTERPOL operation last year, officers raided a warehouse in the Philippines, where more than 250 people were running romance scams on an industrial scale.
An earlier operation had seen police dismantle a scam centre in Namibia, Southern Africa.
Punishments included being chained outdoors for extended periods, locked in dark rooms without food or water for days, and subjected to beatings and electrocution using electric batons.
Andrew Wasuwongse, director of IJM Thailand
There, 88 youths were found to have been forced to conduct scams.
Andrew Wasuwongse, director of IJM Thailand, which supports trafficked former scammers, tells The Sun: “Forced scamming is devastating lives on both sides of the screen.”
While trafficking victims are caged in “brutal compounds”, Brits – from rich business owners to lonely pensioners – are “losing their savings, their confidence, and their peace of mind”.
Andrew continues: “Victims of forced scamming have described enduring extreme punishments for failing to meet scam targets or attempting escape.
“These included being chained outside in the tropical sun, locked in dark rooms without food or water for days, and subjected to beatings and electrocution using electric batons.
“They also reported being forced to stand while holding 20kg water jugs, or being made to drink guards’ urine and denied water.
“Some shared that they were tied up and forced to stand in a pit which was then filled with water up to their necks and left there. Others said they were handcuffed, chained to furniture, beaten with bats and threatened with death, rape or organ removal.
“One woman reported being raped. These testimonies reveal a pattern of systematic abuse under the control of organised crime gang bosses.”
© International Justice MissionAndrew Wasuwongse, director of International Justice Mission Thailand, says he has heard horror stories from freed workers[/caption]
AFPWorkers are trafficked from 66 countries to work at the centre[/caption]
IJM’s research, funded by Safe Online, identified nearly 500 global reports of child sextortion that are likely linked to scam compounds in Southeast Asia.
“Now, with emerging links between these scam operations and child sextortion, children around the world are at risk, too,” adds Andrew.
“This billion-dollar criminal industry is growing fast, constantly evolving – and leaving suffering in its wake across the globe.”
It is not clear whether children are being deliberately targeted by the scammers’ sextortion schemes, or somehow caught up in schemes intended to target adults.
But either way, youngsters are suffering unimaginable harm.
“We’ve known for some time where many of these scam compounds are located,” Eric Heintz, Senior Criminal Analyst at IJM, tells The Sun.
“Tech companies and governments must do more to stop the horrific crimes perpetrated at these compounds – especially now that children are likely being harmed.”
What is sextortion?
Sextortion’ is a type of online blackmail. It’s when criminals threaten to share sexual pictures, videos, or information about you unless you pay money or do something else you don’t want to.
Anyone can be a victim of sextortion. However, young people aged between 15 to 17, and adults aged under 30, are often most at risk.
Criminals often target people through dating apps, social media, webcams, or pornography sites. They may use a fake identity to befriend you online. If a person you’ve just met online chats to you in a sexual way, or asks for sexual images, it might be an attempt at sextortion.
You should be wary if someone you’ve met online:
is trying to start a relationship with you very quickly (they may even send you a sexual image first)
chats to you in a sexual way, or asks for sexual images, soon after you’ve met them.
has sent friend requests to lots of people, not just you
repeatedly asks you to do sexual things that you’re not comfortable with
tells you they’ve hacked your account or have access to your contacts
Sextortion attempts can happen very quickly, or they can happen over a long time. You should never share sexual images or information about yourself if you are not comfortable.
You can still be a victim of sextortion if you haven’t shared sexual images or information. Criminals may have hacked one of your accounts, or created edited or fake images or videos, like deepfakes, of you that appear real.
Even if blackmail isn’t involved, sharing or threatening to share intimate photos or videos of you without your permission is illegal. This is called ‘revenge porn’ or intimate image abuse.
From the Met Police website
Trafficking and legal experts have echoed Eric’s calls for international action.
Lori Cohen, CEO of Protect All Children from Trafficking (PACT), warns: “With the acceleration of technology, blackmailers are getting more sophisticated in how they’re exploiting their victims. This is not a geo-specific problem, but a global crisis.”
And legal expert Adam Jones, of HD Claims, says: “Scam compounds in Southeast Asia represent one of the most sinister forms of organised crime today.”
He adds: “The connection between scam compounds and sextortion reveals a cycle of abuse: trafficking victims forced into crimes, and children left as collateral damage.
“It’s a modern form of slavery with a global reach that demands urgent action.”
While love-struck Brits and traumatised children are suffering the harrowing consequences of cyber scams, the trafficking victims behind the screens are left with long-term scars, too.
Gavesh – who has not told his family about his ordeal due to shame – says: “I still see fake job ads on social media. I still think of the workers who are trapped in the compounds.
“I hope governments across many countries and other agencies will build more awareness of this issue to protect people from trafficking and forced labour. This needs to stop.”
Jun, who is now back in Thailand and working in an online customer service role, adds: “I think this kind of thing will be forever in my memory. It was really terrible.”
*Pseudonyms have been used to protect the trafficking victims’ identities.
Gavesh and Jun spoke to us through the anti-slavery charity International Justice Mission, which is calling on governments and tech companies to investigate the role of scam compounds in the explosion of sextortion.