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“Simple job, high salary”: unveiling the complexity of scam-forced criminality in Southeast Asia

Hai Thanh Luong (2025) — Humanities and Social Sciences Communications

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DOI: 10.1057/s41599-025-05605-1 (opens in a new tab)

Type:   Journal Article
Country:   Global
Tags:   Cyber Enabled Crime, Cyber Enabled Fraud, Fraudulent Job Recruitment, Human Trafficking, Pig Butchering, Scam Forced Criminality, Southeast Asia, Transnational Crime, Victim Offender Overlap, Vietnam
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Synopsis

            
This mixed qualitative study combines content analysis of 10 Vietnamese scam-forced-labor cases from 2018-2023 with interviews with 12 police officers. It examines how fraudulent "simple job, high salary" advertisements recruit workers through social media and move them into scam compounds, particularly in Cambodia. The findings describe multilayered networks led by Chinese actors with Vietnamese and other accomplices, and show how trafficked workers can become both victims of coercion and compelled participants in online fraud. The case material indicates that recruiters target educated workers with customer-service, IT, programming, or related skills. The bounded Vietnamese case set supports structural insight but not a regional prevalence estimate.

          

        
                  

            
Identified Gaps

            
The literature and official records underrepresent scam-forced criminality in Southeast Asia, especially Southern perspectives. The paper identifies limited criminological analysis of victim-offender overlap in cyber-trafficking, incomplete data on Chinese-linked offenders, and uncertainty about the structure and full scale of Chinese cyber-enabled crime networks. Evidence remains insufficient to establish geographic or ethnicity-based targeting patterns.

          

        
                  

            
Methods

            
This Vietnam-focused mixed-methods qualitative case study analyzed 10 law-enforcement-detected scam-forced Vietnamese labor cases from 2018–2023. The author coded case documents and scripts thematically around offenders and victims, locations, trafficking-scam links, and network operations. Twelve Vietnamese law-enforcement officers, selected by geography, institutional role, and relevant experience, completed 35–55 minute semi-structured interviews in Vietnamese; interviews were translated into English and analyzed by themes aligned with the research questions.

          

        
                  

            
Limitations

            
The 10 selected cases are not representative of all Vietnamese regions. Chinese suspects and leaders were generally at large, and slow cross-border cooperation limited confirmation of their identities, roles, and network structure. Nationality-specific criminal records were unavailable, restricting data collection. The study lacks direct accounts from victims and offenders, relying on case records and police interviews; the author notes that triangulating all three perspectives would improve objectivity and completeness.

          

        
                  

            
Future Work

            
Conduct empirical studies across countries to clarify victim-offender overlap in scam-forced criminality. Build a larger regional database, especially including Cambodia and China, to assess whether Chinese cyber-enabled crime networks are loose, hierarchical, or adaptable. Include parallel accounts from victims, offenders, and police. Apply crime-script analysis and the 25 techniques of crime prevention to identify cyber-trafficking activities and interventions.

          

              

    
    

        
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