Online fraud is flourishing globally. Illustration photo: Bloomberg. |
The United Nations has just released a report on transnational crime in East Asia and Southeast Asia, clarifying the scale of the high-tech crime network that is exploding in the region.
Fraudulent centers that combine human trafficking and money laundering, using AI, deepfake, blockchain, etc., are threatening regional and global security. It is alarming that criminal organizations continue to expand their operations, despite the efforts of local authorities to crack down.
"Ecosystem" spreads globally
According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), online fraud networks in Southeast Asia have grown rapidly in recent years.
No longer small gangs, organizations are operating as real “corporations” with foreign technology infrastructure, supply chains, and personnel. Local relationships are also utilized, mainly in places with weak laws.
“We are seeing criminal organizations in East and Southeast Asia expanding globally. This reflects a natural expansion as their operations grow and the need to find new territories, but also a hedging strategy in the face of increased crackdowns in the region,” said Benedikt Hofmann, UNODC’s acting regional representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific .
According to the report, many criminal groups use special economic zones (SEZs) or border areas as their headquarters. They take advantage of lax laws to build fraud centers, online gambling and complex money laundering networks.
The "supply chain" of criminal organizations with illegal online gambling services. Photo: UNODC . |
Hofmann described online fraud centers as “spreading like cancer.” When authorities discover them, they simply move to another area, unable to address the root cause.
“Essentially, this situation turns the region into a connected ecosystem, run by sophisticated organizations that exploit weaknesses, endangering national sovereignty ,” Hofmann emphasized.
The situation is even more worrying as organizations use new technologies such as AI, blockchain, and voice-mimicking software. This allows for the creation of new fraud scenarios, leveraging technology to improve operational processes, and expanding money laundering channels.
Particularly serious is the problem of forced labor. Thousands of people from more than 50 countries are lured to the scam center through recruitment posts. They are detained, beaten, have their identity documents confiscated and forced to participate in the scam. Those who do not meet the quota are threatened, tortured or sold to other groups as mobile “assets”.
Criminal activities have also developed to the point that many organizations operate under the BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) model. In the Philippines, organizations cooperate with many global companies to provide call center, IT, software design services, etc. They are located in buildings and industrial parks, becoming a "cover" for illegal activities.
Although there are no large-scale gangs, Vietnam still records many people being tricked into going to fraud centers, serving behind-the-scenes activities such as money laundering, recruitment, and gambling platform operations... Vietnam's data in the report was contributed by the Anti-Fraud organization .
Important background
One of the key links in the Southeast Asian cybercrime ecosystem is Huione Guarantee. Operating primarily in Chinese, it acts as a payment intermediary and underwrites underground transactions between criminal groups.
According to analysis from research organization Elliptic and a report by UNODC, Huione Guarantee is considered the world's largest digital "black market" for illegal financial transactions.
Huione Guarantee is owned by Huione Group, headquartered in Phnom Penh (Cambodia). This platform is introduced as a tool to support secure payments between buyers and sellers. However, in reality, this is where criminal gangs exchange stolen data, sell fake software, AI tools to create deepfakes...
Data shows that Huione Guarantee processed at least $24 billion in cryptocurrencies between 2021 and 2024, through e-wallets linked to thousands of scammers.
A "provider" advertises money laundering services on Huione Guarantee using the "pig butchering" love trap trick. Photo: Elliptic . |
The platform acts as an e-commerce marketplace for cybercriminals, offering a variety of services and software to support criminal activities. Notably, many of the services are localized, allowing them to impersonate police or bank employees in each country, using local languages and AI to increase credibility.
Despite announcing its separation from Huione Group at the end of 2024 and changing its name to Haowang Guarantee, evidence from researchers shows that the two entities are still closely linked.
Previously, Huione Group's payment division, named Huione Pay, had publicly supported transactions on Huione Guarantee, but quietly removed the information from the website when it attracted the attention of the media and cybersecurity organizations.
Not only connecting criminal organizations in the Mekong region, law enforcement agencies also discovered transactions related to Huione in many fraud cases in Australia, Canada, Japan, Europe...
Recently, Huione also issued stablecoins, a form of cryptocurrency tied to the USD, to avoid bank control and make it difficult to trace.
According to UNODC, hundreds of fraud centers generate profits of nearly $40 billion a year. Their activities are not limited to Asia, but have spread to many regions. This shows that cybercriminal organizations are increasing cooperation and expanding rapidly.
Source: https://znews.vn/tap-doan-lua-dao-truc-tuyen-mo-rong-tu-dong-nam-a-post1548674.html
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