Lately, there has been a lot of talk about the multibillion-dollar online scam industry that has proliferated in Southeast Asia, where so-called pig butchering schemes run out of industrial-scale scam factories use trust to lure unassuming victims into handing over money.
These cons have not only swindled victims out of billions of dollars, but also fueled human trafficking and potentially even the Thai-Cambodian border crisis.
Lately, there has been a lot of talk about the multibillion-dollar online scam industry that has proliferated in Southeast Asia, where so-called pig butchering schemes run out of industrial-scale scam factories use trust to lure unassuming victims into handing over money.
These cons have not only swindled victims out of billions of dollars, but also fueled human trafficking and potentially even the Thai-Cambodian border crisis.
Scam compounds are just one kind of grift with international consequences that Foreign Policy has covered recently. This edition of the Reading List sheds light on scams past and present, including the U.S. Navy’s infamous entanglement with Malaysian felon “Fat Leonard,” the cryptocurrency con years of the early 2020s, and the cracks in regulatory frameworks that have fueled their rise.
Workers ride their motor-cart loaded with glass past a branch of the Prince Bank in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on Oct. 15.
Workers ride their motor-cart loaded with glass past a branch of the Prince Bank in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on Oct. 15.Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP via Getty Images
Is Cambodia’s Scam Industry Too Big to Fail?
New sanctions on the world’s wealthiest criminal could threaten the Hun dynasty, Jack Adamović Davies writes.
A photo illustration of Sam Bankman-Fried surrounded by Bitcoin with a smirk on his face.
Foreign Policy Illustration
The Crypto Con Years Aren’t Over Yet
Three books explore the failures of regulators—and sometimes journalists, David Gerard writes.
A photo collage illustration shows Navy brass pictured with Fat Leonard raising glasses against a backdrop of Navy ships in the Pacific. Overlaid text reads: Wanted by U.S. Marshals next to a round image of Fat Leonard applying a spa facial mask.
A photo collage illustration shows U.S. Navy brass pictured with Leonard Glenn Francis, known as “Fat Leonard,” raising glasses against a backdrop of Navy ships in the Pacific. Foreign Policy illustration/Getty Images, AP, and NCIS-DCIS case file photos
‘Fat Leonard’ Was a Crook U.S. Admirals Called Bro
In the Navy, you can do as you please, FP’s James Palmer writes.
A pile of mostly red flowers rests at the feet of a statue of a soldier. Behind it are the large letters Z and V and graves.
A monument to Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine stands at a burial site in Kostroma, Russia, on Oct. 20. Andrey Borodulin/AFP via Getty Images
The Deathonomics of Putin’s War
“Black widows” marrying soldiers to collect death benefits are symptomatic of society-wide rot, Alexey Kovalev writes.
A sign warning against illegal work online is pictured in Thailand’s Mae Sot district near the Myanmar border on Feb. 11.
A sign warning against illegal work online is pictured in Thailand’s Mae Sot district near the Myanmar border on Feb. 11. Lillian Suwanrumpha/AFP via Getty Images
China Can’t Keep Its Hands Clean in Myanmar’s Scam Cities
Ties between organized crime syndicates and Chinese intelligence run deep, Benedict Rogers writes.
