This story first appeared in The New Indian Express
Along with MEA, the Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) is giving a lot of attention to check organised cybercrime gangs from South East Asian countries, that include Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos PDR.
BENGALURU: He was held captive along with several other Indians in a sprawling campus in Myawaddy, on the Myanmar-Thailand border, where they were reportedly asked to honey-trap at least three Americans on microblogging social media platform ‘X’ every day. “We were instructed to transfer the chats to our Chinese and Myanmarese ‘employees’ on their WhatsApp and Telegram groups after befriending these Americans, and the former would then scam them using their chat details,” said Jeevan, a business executive from Karnataka and one of four men from the state who were rescued along with other Indians by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA). The four recently returned to India from Yangon and Bangkok.
These men were conned into taking up fraudulent marketing jobs in Thailand, but landed in Myanmar instead, where they were allegedly held in captivity and forced to honey-trap foreigners, mainly Americans, using fake profiles of female models. “The Chinese men on campus share the X post profiles of some Americans, who are in their mid-40s and 50s and with a huge following on the microblogging social media platform. They ask us to impersonate female models and celebrities, and befriend the Americans using a script given by them. Once they got comfortable with us, we were asked to hand over our chats to our captors, who would scam the Americans using chat details,” he said.
While chatting, some ‘online American friends’ would ask for an audio call. “There were three Russian and Chinese women on site, who would impersonate models and speak to them. If the latter demanded a video call, they were blocked,” said Jeevan.
Jeevan was twice conned into fraudulent overseas jobs, the first time in August 2022, when he had come across a job vacancy of a marketing executive in Bangkok on Facebook, on a monthly salary of 1500 USD. Instead of Thailand, he was taken to Myanmar, but was lucky the first time and got off the hook due to pressure from the Indian and Myanmar governments.
Despite one bad experience and MEA’s strong advisory on overseas job offers, Jeevan again fell into the trap of a fraudulent job offer in Yangon by an Indian agent in December 2022. “I was taken to Myawaddi campus and protested with others. That’s when they locked us in rooms without food and water. In March 2023, we held a massive protest and demanded that we be sent back to India. I managed to send an email to the MEA, Protector of Emigrants (PoE), Bengaluru, and Mandya SP from my mobile phone, to rescue us. The Indian embassy swung into action and helped us but my Chinese captor demanded Rs 1,10,000 from me to be free. I spoke to my family and they sent the money,” narrated Jeevan.
He added that there are “hundreds of Indians still trapped on the campus at Myawaddy on the Myanmar-Thailand border, forced into running the writ of the Chinese and Myanmarese scamsters”.
Along with MEA, the Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) is giving a lot of attention to check organised cybercrime gangs from South East Asian countries, that include Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos PDR. The Ministry of Home Affairs has set up an inter-ministerial committee headed by a top security officer.