Extraordinary scenes have been unfolding in Phnom Penh in recent months. Crackdowns on notorious scam centers—sites where workers are paid and/or coerced into scamming people in wealthy countries—have led to the release or escape of thousands of workers. There are more questions than answers about what will happen to them.
People who were tricked or trafficked into Cambodian scam compounds may lack work permission, given the shadowy nature of these crimes. Visa overstay fines of $10/day have compounded into the thousands of dollars, and many people cannot afford to pay the fines needed to leave Cambodia. They may also not have access to their passports, if these were seized by traffickers.
“This mass exodus from scamming compounds has created a humanitarian crisis on the streets,” an Amnesty International staffer has said. The crisis is extending the trauma of many people who faced horrific physical and sexual violence inside the compounds. Amnesty International has previously identified at least 53 scam centers in Cambodia; this is likely an undercount. The organization has also spoken with dozens of people whose conditions meet the legal definition of slavery.
Enforcement operations against the scam industry require better planning for the survivors, emphasizes researcher Ling Li. She co-founded the nonprofit organization EOS Collective, which supports survivors of the Cambodian scam industry. “Without a reception plan, raids risk creating a humanitarian crisis. When hundreds of people are removed at once, they immediately need shelter, identification, interpretation, and a safe way to contact families and embassies. If these are not prepared in advance, victims can end up homeless, detained for immigration reasons, or quickly re-exploited.” A coordinated plan, Li says, “helps victims cooperate as witnesses and prevents criminal networks from simply replacing them with new recruits.”
There appears to be no coordinated approach to dealing now with people who have recently left scam compounds. They represent many different nationalities, reportedly including US nationals. Embassies are taking their own measures to assist their citizens. For instance, Kenya has obtained a waiver of visa overstay fines, while China and Indonesia have obtained shelter for their citizens waiting for deportation.
Li reports that the Philippines is conducting its own victim identification and providing support after repatriation. That continued support is crucial given that vulnerability doesn’t end once an ex-scam center worker is back home. Overall, the Philippines has been doing more than most countries to aid its nationals involved in foreign scamming operations. In general, embassies need to provide travel documents and coordinate with the Cambodian government for safe repatriation, Ling says.
However, Amnesty International has criticized the Cambodian government for ignoring the problem. Recent escapees told Amnesty International that police would remove dead bodies from their scam compounds, yet would not go after the managers of the sites where murder and abuse were occurring.
The full scale of the complicity is hard to establish. Jacob Sims, a researcher at Harvard University’s Asia Center, said at a recent Stimson Center event that the current wave of enforcement against scam centers is stronger than previous ones, but remains tokenistic as the elites have mostly not been touched. The Cambodian government has protected the industry in an extremely lucrative collaboration between criminal and political elites, according to Sims.
Critiquing the government remains dangerous for Cambodian journalists, who continue to be arrested for reporting on scam compounds. A Cambodian government official has said that it is screening people to separate out the victims from the perpetrators, yet the line between the two can be very blurry.
Overall, “experiences reported by victims suggest that law enforcement interaction is often framed through immigration control rather than victim identification,” Li says. “The Cambodian government plays a decisive role because it controls legal status and victim identification. Many anti-trafficking organizations can only intervene once a person is formally recognised as a trafficking victim…Without identification, individuals remain classified as immigration violators and cannot safely access protection or repatriation procedures.”
Given their financial desperation and meager options, it’s unsurprising that some people are returning to scam compounds that continue to proliferate and recruit, despite the recent crackdowns. Journalist Mech Dara, who was previously arrested after doggedly reporting on the Cambodian cybercrime industry, reports that some people have been recruited into Sri Lankan operations.
Dara and others have also condemned the inactivity of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN agency that has been heavily weakened as part of U.S. cuts to global development spending since the beginning of 2025. According to Li, IOM Cambodia has told trafficking victims that they could not be supported, and could not find temporary accommodation because it would be illegal for people without valid visas to be hosted. IOM Cambodia did not respond to a request for comment from Forbes.
Emergency shelters are doing what they can, but they too have been diminished by global aid cuts. They’re overwhelmed by the scale of the need. People without access to support are crowding into housing where they can, or sleeping on the street or in the forest.
Li says that in practice, international and local organizations “carry most of the immediate humanitarian responsibility,” being in the best position to provide emergency shelter and food, medical and psychological assistance, interpretation and communication, and legal and logistical support.
She warns, “A major gap today is information and immediate support: many stranded people simply do not know what will happen to them, how long it will take, or what their rights are. They also are just trying to survive. Providing clear case management and immediate shelter is the most essential now.”
This is part of a series on the transnational romance fraud industry. One article in the series focuses on the perspective of a Ugandan man trafficked into Southeast Asia. Another focuses on the perspective of an American woman duped into a relationship with someone in West Africa.
