Myanmar Military Captures 2,000 in Cybercrime Center Raid

BANGKOK (AP) — Myanmar’s military has shut down a major online scam operation near the border with Thailand, detaining more than 2,000 people and seizing dozens of Starlink satellite internet terminals, state media reported Monday.

Myanmar is notorious for hosting cyberscam operations responsible for bilking people all over the world. These usually involve gaining victims’ confidence online with romantic ploys and bogus investment pitches.

The centers are infamous for recruiting workers from other countries under false pretenses, promising them legitimate jobs and then holding them captive and forcing them to carry out criminal activities.

Scam operations were in the international spotlight last week when the United States and Britain enacted sanctions against organizers of a major Cambodian cyberscam gang, and its alleged ringleader was indicted by a federal court in New York.

According to a report in Monday’s Myanma Alinn newspaper, the army raided KK Park, a well-documented cybercrime center, as part of operations starting in early September to suppress online fraud, illegal gambling, and cross-border cybercrime.

It published photos displaying seized Starlink equipment and soldiers said to be carrying out the raid, though it was unclear when exactly they were taken.

KK Park is located on the outskirts of Myawaddy, a major trading town on the border with Thailand in Myanmar’s Kayin state. The area is only loosely under the control of Myanmar’s military government, and also falls under the influence of ethnic minority militias.

Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun, the spokesperson for the military government, charged in a statement Monday night that the top leaders of the Karen National Union, an armed ethnic organization opposed to army rule, were involved in the scam projects at KK Park.

The allegation was previously made based on claims that a company backed by the Karen group allowed the land to be leased. However, the Karen, who are part of the larger armed resistance movement in Myanmar’s civil war, deny any involvement in the scams.

Myanma Alinn said the army ascertained that more than 260 buildings were unregistered, and seized equipment, including 30 sets of Starlink satellite internet terminals. It said 2,198 individuals were detained though it did not give their nationalities.

Starlink is part of Elon Musk’s SpaceX company and the terminals link to its satellites. It does not have licensed operations in Myanmar, but at least hundreds of terminals have been smuggled into the Southeast Asian nation.

The company could not be immediately reached for comment Monday but its policy bans “conduct that is defamatory, fraudulent, obscene, or deceptive.”

There have been previous crackdowns on cyberscam operations in Myanmar earlier this year and in 2023.

Facing pressure from China, Thailand and Myanmar’s governments launched an operation in February in which they released thousands of trafficked people from scam compounds, working with the ethnic armed groups that rule Myanmar’s border areas.