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The Inside Story of Southeast Asia’s Brutal Fraud Compounds

People around the world have lost billions of dollars to scams. But the scammers are often victims, too. We’re taking you inside their world.

Scam Factories is a special multimedia and podcast series by The Conversation that explores the inner workings of Southeast Asia’s brutal scam compounds.

Multimedia series

People around the globe are swindled out of billions of dollars a year in scams. The scammers, though, are sometimes victims, too. Many are often duped into jobs, then trapped in compounds and subjected to unspeakable violence.

Online scam operations are booming in Southeast Asia due to lax regulations, organised crime networks and corrupt local officials. Our authors are on the trail of the powerful, shadowy figures at the top.

Escaping a scam compound is rife with risk. Some workers break out of compounds en masse; others jump from high windows to freedom. Those who succeed then face persistent questions from authorities and their families about whether they are truly a victim.

Podcast series

Listen to Scam Factories on The Conversation Weekly podcast.

Credits

The lead authors of the series are Ivan Franceschini, a lecturer in Chinese Studies at the University of Melbourne; Ling Li, a PhD candidate at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice; and Mark Bo, an independent researcher.

The podcast series was written and produced by Gemma Ware with production assistance from Katie Flood and Mend Mariwany. Sound design by Michelle Macklem. Leila Goldstein was our producer in Cambodia and Halima Athumani recorded for us in Uganda. Hui Lin was our Chinese translator. Photos by Roun Ry, KDA, Halima Athumani and Ivan Franceschini.

Justin Bergman at The Conversation in Australia edited the articles in the series and Matt Garrow worked on the multimedia elements of the stories. Series oversight and editing help from Ashlynne McGhee.

FraudAlert: The South Sea Bubble in the 18th century was one of the first recorded stock market frauds.

Read More at The Conversation

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