A new type of online fraud emanating from scam sweatshops in Southeast Asia is facing its first major crackdown. Cambodian authorities have stepped up raids on compounds alleged to house workers engaging in online fraud, seizing computers, phones and electric shock batons and freeing thousands of involuntary workers. And Apple has removed from its app store two popular trading apps that cybercriminal groups in Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar have used to defraud people.
The moves are likely to disrupt — perhaps only temporarily — the lucrative global scam known as “pig butchering.” Named for its analogy to a farmer fattening up a hog before slaughtering it, the fraud relies on convincing people to deposit more and more money into fake online platforms controlled by swindlers. Once the targets become unable or unwilling to deposit more funds, they’re informed that they’ve lost access to their cash and can retrieve it only by depositing more money or paying a hefty fee, a process that compounds their losses.
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