Caught in Cambodia’s Scam Machine: Part 1

Summary

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Up First (NPR) – "Caught in Cambodia’s Scam Machine: Part 1" (June 21, 2026)

Overview

This episode inaugurates a two-part series exploring Cambodia’s hidden cyber scam industry, focusing not on those scammed—but on the workers trapped inside the operations. Through exclusive, on-the-ground reporting, primarily through the story of “Schwaib,” a Ugandan trafficked to Cambodia, listeners gain a rare, human view into the mechanics, coercion, and trauma of one of the world’s biggest criminal enterprises.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Scale and Secrecy of Cambodia’s Scam Compounds

• Location/Description: Reporter Shabani Matani visits a sprawling, fortress-like industrial compound outside Phnom Penh, “set up like an office park, but fortified against the outside world.” (00:14)
  • "There's Bob DW around CCTVs. You can see lookout posts as well on the top of the buildings." — Shabani Matani (00:30)
  • 20,000 people once lived there; abruptly abandoned, littered with trash—“Times Square could fit in this.” (00:57)
• Industry Reach: Scam compounds operated with impunity for years, targeting millions globally, raking in more than $20 billion in fraud annually—estimated at half of Cambodia’s GDP in 2024. (01:05)

2. The Crackdown and Access to Survivors

• Recent raids (beginning January 2026) led to the release of over 200,000 workers from at least 35 countries, many left stranded, unable to repatriate. (04:01)
• Opportunity for reporters to access and hear first-hand from scam workers, most of whom were trafficked under false pretenses.

3. Schwaib’s Journey: Targeted, Trapped, and Traumatized

• Initial Recruitment via TikTok: Schwaib (24, Kampala, Uganda) is lured by a job offering $800–$1200/month, vastly higher than local wages. (08:04)
  • “It was a targeted job ad... promising somewhere between $800 to $1,000 for a month's work in Cambodia, visa free, air ticket.” – Shabani Matani (08:07)
• Too Good to Be True: All arrangements handled by recruiter—no upfront payment, visa and flights covered. (09:09)
  • “This is a miracle. I never spent in any coin. Everything came in so smooth, but I was like, it was too good to be true.” – Schwaib (10:00)
• Arrival Experience: VIP treatment upon landing; meets international cohort at Bavette Business Center. (12:01)
  • “There were Pakistan, Nepali, the Ghanaians, Nigerians, Ugandans, Kenyans, Tanzanians...different tribes.” – Schwaib (14:02)
• First Red Flags: Forced to surrender passport, given an ID that is immediately confiscated—cannot leave. (14:28)

4. Life Inside the Compound

• “Work” Setup: After a week, Schwaib receives dozens of phones and US SIM cards—ostensibly for remote work. (16:34)
  • “Why did they have hundreds of computers, thousands of SIM cards?” – Shabani Matani (17:03)
• Realization of Scam Role: Functions as a “receptionist” in a three-tier system (“developers,” “receptionists,” “killers”). (18:23)
  • “We are specialized in three categories. There were the developers, they were the receptionists, and they were the killers.” – Schwaib (18:23)
• Task Scam Tactics:
  • Scripts used to build trust (“I’m Sarah… I’m Antonella Camboni, an Italian living in California…”).
  • Clients (mostly Americans) drawn in through remote marketing “jobs”, gradually coaxed into making and increasing deposits.
  • If a client trusted the system, interaction is escalated to the “killers,” who “empty out the whole wallet.” (21:46)
  • “After each kill, the killers would celebrate... They used to beat the drum like ten times.” – Schwaib (22:06)

5. Surveillance and Coercion

• Constant Monitoring: Phones regularly checked; severe consequences for leaking information.
  • “If they find out, like you sent anyone a picture... that means it was going to be bad for you.” – Schwaib (23:12)
• Torture as Deterrence: Describes an “isolation room” for punishment—tied, beaten; friend’s face covered in wounds after a night there. (23:40)

6. Entrapment and Exploitation

• Impossible Debts: Workers told they owe $4,000 if they try to leave early—trapping them. (24:37)
• Fines and Deductions: Fined for minor “infractions,” from not meeting quotas to wanting to sit by a window. Strict Muslim dietary needs ignored, forcing extra expenses.
• No Communication Home: Could not tell family; “They never knew anything.” – Schwaib (26:59)

7. Psychological Impact

• Severe Stress and Guilt: Turned to sleeping pills, insomnia rampant. (27:04)
• Blaming the Victims: Gradually, Schwaib resented not just bosses, but victims’ own “greed.”
  • “They are greedy. Anyone who is coming is just greedy ... it is too good to be true.” – Schwaib (27:49)

8. The Scam Industry as a True Corporation

• Detailed hierarchy: team leaders, managers, HR, PR, with external infrastructure (drivers, security, “landlords” with government connections) enabling the operations. (29:10)

9. Regional and Global Pressures

• Regional Tensions: July 2025, Thailand attacks Cambodia over scam compounds—dubbed “Scambodia”; leads to intensification of crackdown.
• High-profile Crackdown: Arrest and extradition of kingpin Chen TZE to China; causes panic among compound bosses. (31:55)

10. The Revolt and Escape

• Worker Uprisings: In January 2026, staff revolt, surround bosses’ headquarters, demand exit and return of passports. (32:42)
  • “We knew that this is our only chance to escape from here.” – Schwaib (32:42)
• Risky Freedom: Workers allowed to leave, but at great risk—no support, now fugitives amid ongoing crackdown in Cambodia.
• Schwaib’s Escape: February 1, 2026: Spends last savings to reach Phnom Penh, facing an uncertain future. (33:54)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "I was trafficked in Cambodia for like a fake promise of a job." – Schwaib (05:10)
• “When I saw him, I knew that I was up. That’s what came in my head. I said, I’m up and I don’t have any way back... me, I have to go back home.” – Schwaib, after witnessing a friend's brutalization (23:54)
• “The guilt ate away at Schwaib slowly… I started praying that the clients who withdrew their profits wouldn’t come back.” – Shabani Matani (27:17)
• “They run like a business... team leaders, managers, HR, PR division, even the fruit vendors and the security guards are in on it.” – Shabani Matani (29:10)
• “We just want our passports to go.” – Schwaib (32:55)
• "I couldn’t tell them because I didn’t want them to worry... Because even if I told them, there was nothing they were going to do about it." – Schwaib, on why he hid his plight from family (26:49)

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Key Timestamps

• 00:07 – Entry to abandoned scam compound
• 01:05 – Scale of Cambodia’s scam industry
• 04:01 – Arrival of flood of scam survivors to Phnom Penh
• 08:04 – Schwaib recounts TikTok recruitment
• 14:28 – Schwaib surrenders passport, loses freedom
• 18:23 – Inside the Scam: “receptionists” and “killers” roles
• 21:46 – “Killers” take over; drum celebration after a "kill"
• 23:12 – Surveillance and isolation room torture
• 24:37 – Threatened with $4,000 debt for escape
• 27:49 – Schwaib’s shift to blaming victims
• 29:10 – Scam as an international business operation
• 31:55 – Kingpin Chen TZE arrested, causing panic
• 32:42 – Workers’ revolt, demand for release
• 33:54 – Schwaib’s escape to Phnom Penh

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Tone and Style

The reporting is immersive and empathetic, interweaving hard investigative detail with Schwaib’s raw testimony. Despite the matter-of-fact, sometimes clinical journalistic structure, the episode is laced with emotional first-person confessions, creating an intimate window into systemic exploitation.

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Part 2 Preview: The next episode promises to follow Schwaib’s attempts to survive on Phnom Penh’s streets—and the difficulties facing workers even after escaping the scam compounds.

Transcript

[Aisha Rascoe]

Aisha. I'm Aisha Rascoe and you're listening to the Sunday Story from Up First.

[Shabani Matani]

So we've come in through the back now. Security guards stopped us. They didn't allow me to take any photos.

[Aisha Rascoe]

Earlier this year, investigative reporter Shabani Mattani visited a massive industrial complex outside of Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh. It's set up like an office park, but it's fortified against the outside world.

[Shabani Matani]

There's Bob DW around CCTVs. You can see lookout posts as well on the top of the buildings.

[Aisha Rascoe]

People once lived here, about 20,000 of them.

[Shabani Matani]

Looks like dormitories, sort of white buildings with black rails and with bars on the windows.

[Aisha Rascoe]

And it's clear that it was abruptly abandoned.

[Shabani Matani]

So much trash. It's a whole little city. I mean, Times Square could fit in this. So all of these are hallmarks of a scam compound.

[Aisha Rascoe]

This cyber scam compound is among dozens in Cambodia that operated with impunity for years. Migrants were brought to these places from throughout Asia and Africa and put to work scamming people on the other side of the world. According to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint center, the cyber scam industry managed to defraud Americans of more than $20 billion last year. And in 2024, experts estimated that profits from the cyber scamming industry were equivalent to roughly half of Cambodia's formal gdp. But in the last several months, under international pressure, the Cambodian government has accelerated a sweeping crackdown on the industry. Scam operations have been raided and shut down and more than 200,000 scam workers have been released. With this ongoing effort, reporters have gained unprecedented access to a previously hidden world. Today on the Sunday story, we have an exclusive two part series on the global cyberscam industry. We're going to take a deeper look, not from the perspective of people who were scammed, but from the people who once took part in the scamming. Shibani Matani is based in Singapore. She's been covering Southeast Asia for more than 15 years and she's been following the cyber scam industry for the past three. When we come back, Shebani Matani takes us to Cambodia.

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[Aisha Rascoe]

we're back with a Sunday story. Here's investigative reporter Shibani Mattani.

[Shabani Matani]

Since January, the Cambodian government has ramped up its raids on scam compounds across the country. And as a result, some 200,000 scam workers have poured into the streets of Phnom Penh. These people are from all over the world, at least 35 countries. And I saw reports of people streaming to the embassy gates, literally waiting outside, banging on the door, asking for help to be repatriated home. And even today, many of them are still unable to get home. So this spring, I decided to go to Phnom Penh and try to speak to some of them. I wanted to know what was their first hand experience of the scam industry. How did they end up in Cambodia? I thought they could give an unfiltered view of the inner workings of this industry. I spoke to dozens of people on that trip. Most of the scam workers were from China and also from Indonesia. But it surprised me how many of them came from Africa.

[Schwaib]

My name is Ismail. My name is Oscar.

[NPR Sponsor Announcer]

My name is Ama.

[Shabani Matani]

And all the stories were actually remarkably similar.

[Schwaib]

I was trafficked in Cambodia for like a fake promise of a job.

[Shabani Matani]

The job was offering $1,200. So I was like, wow, this is a good opportunity. So I texted them and in a week or two, I was able to travel and come. In recent years, crime syndicates have focused on scamming Westerners. So they've heavily recruited workers from English speaking countries in Africa like Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone. On this trip, the majority of the Africans I spoke to were from Uganda. Sometimes, you know, it was difficult to get deep into conversation. You know, some of them were also obviously very cautious because they didn't want to expose the inner workings of scam compounds that they believed were still so powerful. But I did manage to sit down and get to know one man really, really well. And that was through A friend of mine who introduced me to him, my friend, his name is Mej Dara. He's a Cambodian journalist based in Phnom Penh. And Dara and I, we spent the week together zooming around in his little tuk tuk. He's also a tuk tuk driver, sometimes to earn extra money. And it was through Dara that I got introduced to one Ugandan man in particular. His name is shwaib and he's 24. We would come to know each other pretty well over the next few weeks. Schweib and I ended up meeting in person for the first time at a Cambodian burger chain called Lucky Burgers. I saw him from the back first. I could see even from the door when I went in that he was pretty tall, but mostly really lanky. He was wearing sort of dark gray baseball cap and acid wash jeans and a grayish black T shirt. When we sat down, he had his phone out and he was taking little notes on his phone and he seemed kind of nervous. Then once he starts speaking, I had to sort of figure out times that I could interrupt him because once he started talking, he really opened up about his story and just got really into it and kept going. Schwaib asked me to identify him by just his first name for his security, because what he shares about the inner workings of these criminal syndicates which continue to operate today in his own role could put him at risk. Risk. Schweib told me his story from the beginning, before he even arrived in Cambodia. And, you know, I think it's important because it reveals the long and really the truly global reach of the scam industry. So Schwaib is from Kampala, the capital of Uganda. One day In January of 2025, he was sick in bed, scrolling TikTok. When he saw something that made him stop for a little bit.

[Schwaib]

First it was on TikTok. You know, on TikTok there are some kind of ads.

[Shabani Matani]

It was a targeted job ad on his for your page, promising somewhere between 800 to $1,000 for a month's work

[Schwaib]

in Cambodia, visa free air ticket. Then I was like, these are scammers. Then I left it.

[Shabani Matani]

So at first he actually dismissed it and he kept scrolling.

[Schwaib]

Then after scrolling some couple of days also, I saw it again and I was like, it doesn't cost me anything to send a message. Why shouldn't I? I sent a message on TikTok and

[Shabani Matani]

right away he was sent a WhatsApp number to continue the conversation with a recruiter. The recruiter told him that there were a few different positions available, that there was a lot of work. He could be a supermarket attendant, a delivery driver, or a warehouse worker. And on top of that, they would even cover his visa and his travel expenses and food and accommodation once he got there. It was a pretty big deal, because in Kampala, someone like Schwaipe could only earn about 150, $200 a month. The person on the other end of the phone was offering him up to $1,000 a month.

[Schwaib]

I was like, ah, that's a big income. I can go there maybe like two years. I can get some source of income. And I said, okay, it is okay. I don't care which work I will be doing, as long as I get paid.

[Shabani Matani]

Schweib had always relied on himself. He has 10 siblings, and both his parents passed away by the time he was 18, so he had to drop out of school and get a job. He worked in kitchens for a few years, eventually getting promoted to a chef.

[Schwaib]

Everything was going so, so well. Then I became sick.

[Shabani Matani]

Schwaib struggled for years with debilitating stomach ulcers. The stress of his work sometimes made them worse, and eventually he was forced to take bed rest.

[Schwaib]

Then I had to first take a break.

[Shabani Matani]

After those initial messages, the recruiter told Tribe what they needed from him, and it actually wasn't much.

[Schwaib]

I told me, do you have a passport? Then I filled up the papers, everything they asked me for.

[Shabani Matani]

He sent them his passport information and filled out all his personal details.

[Schwaib]

I did everything they asked me to,

[Shabani Matani]

and everything was just moving so quickly that it didn't seem real by the

[Schwaib]

time I took it serious. It was when they asked me, when are you going to travel? Then I told them, two weeks. Can you travel in one week? Then I was like, okay. Then after like, two days, they sent me a visa. The visa. The visa of Cambodia. Then after, like, two days, that's when they sent me a ticket. This is a miracle. I never spent in any coin. Everything came in so smooth, but I was like, it was too good to be true.

[Shabani Matani]

Schwaib had to leave in a hurry. When he got to the airport in Kampala, he met a group of 10 others, all guys who were also headed to Cambodia. They showed their passports and were quickly ushered through.

[Schwaib]

The guy was like, kind of was so friendly. The guy asked me, is this your first time to travel? And I was like, yes, this is my first time to travel. He went, okay, good luck. Then he stamped in. Then he proceeded.

[Shabani Matani]

Schreibert never stepped foot on a plane before so as he boarded, he felt such a rush of emotion.

[Schwaib]

And I was sorry. I was so happy. I took some pictures. Then when the plane left off, that's when I knew that now this is real. I'm out of home. Let me go. And do what? Let me go and search for. Get some money. Then I come back home.

[Shabani Matani]

Schwaipe landed in the Phnom Penh Airport on February 10, 2025. His new employers had sent a driver to pick him up outside the terminal.

[Schwaib]

The car, it was. It was Lexus.

[Shabani Matani]

It was Lexus.

[Schwaib]

Yeah, it was Lexus. Oh, wow.

[Shabani Matani]

And the driver even helped him with his bags.

[Schwaib]

We were like the bosses by the time the guy took our bags. Then he told us that, you follow me, you follow me. Then he went to the car. Even the guy opened the doors for us.

[Shabani Matani]

It felt like VIP treatment. The group of 10 Ugandans split up into different cars. So it was just Schwaib and one other guy who got into the Lexus, bound for the same location. And then they drove and drove and they kept driving.

[Schwaib]

We traveled for five hours.

[Shabani Matani]

They drove at night. And he really couldn't get his bearings.

[Schwaib]

So we were so silent in the car.

[Shabani Matani]

It was totally pitch dark. And the main thing that was illuminating the streets were just the lights of the cars on the road with him. Beyond that, there wasn't much to see. And after they drove for such a long time through these potholed roads and deserted roads, suddenly he saw a city come into view. And suddenly he felt a totally different pulse. He started to hear music.

[Schwaib]

A lot of people there. Lot of music.

[Shabani Matani]

Almost like a party.

[Schwaib]

It was like a festival.

[Shabani Matani]

It's like 10pm and somehow everyone was awake. He thought it was like a rave, actually, because they're playing this music. And it was music that. That he liked.

[Schwaib]

It is good music. It is edm.

[Shabani Matani]

EDM music with heavy beats. And he stepped out of the car and he thinks, oh, my gosh. Like, wow, where. Where have I landed? This is gonna be. This is gonna be good. Like, people here seem to really be enjoying themselves.

[Schwaib]

They are partying, they are working. Yeah, we are going to enjoy our life here.

[Shabani Matani]

A straight entered the compound. The illuminated sign said Bavette Business Center. He noticed how multinational it was. He saw Chinese people, he saw Filipinos, he saw Vietnamese people. He heard a lot of different languages.

[Schwaib]

There were Pakistan, Nepali, the Ghanaians, Nigerians, Ugandans, Kenyans, Tanzanians. There were a lot of people there and different tribes.

[Shabani Matani]

When the driver dropped him off, he left and there was another guy who Brought him in. This guy was Chinese and he introduced himself as the boss of the company. He greeted him and asked him to hand over his passport. So Shrib gave him his passport.

[Schwaib]

They took our passport. That's the number one.

[Shabani Matani]

Someone showed him a room and told him that was the room that he would be staying in and that he was going to share that room with a number of other guys too.

[Schwaib]

Now you have to rest. We will get back to you tomorrow since you are tired. Then we slept.

[Shabani Matani]

The next day he signed his contract.

[Schwaib]

We are called in the office. We had to sign the contract. The contract was in Chinese. Then there were also some part of English.

[Shabani Matani]

And the contract stipulated that he would be paid US$850 a month. They would provide him three meals a day and accommodation.

[Schwaib]

Then they gave us their computers.

[Shabani Matani]

Schweib says they walked him to his station and to help him get set up, they told him what to download a VPN, Telegram, WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok and basically described it to him as sort of remote online work.

[Schwaib]

I'm just going to enjoy working on your computer. That is my hobby.

[Shabani Matani]

I can do this. Yeah, no problem.

[Schwaib]

Me, I was even on YouTube enjoying the music because I even had some earpods. I was enjoying the music.

[Shabani Matani]

Shrib told me that he was given several days to acclimate, but right away certain things felt a little off. After he'd signed the contract with the bosses, he was taken to a separate administrative building where Cambodian guards took his photograph and gave him an ID card to use for entering and leaving the main gates of Bavet Business Center. But Schweib said the Chinese bosses then took their ID card away.

[Schwaib]

When we went back to the office, they removed the IDs from us.

[Shabani Matani]

Now he couldn't freely leave the complex.

[Schwaib]

We went outside, we made some tour around the park to see what is going on. There were a lot of buildings. What I can say it is like a small town, a small developed town. Bars, shops, there was a hospital, there are supermarkets, some loans. There's nothing that you need outside.

[Shabani Matani]

So when did you start realizing, wait a minute, this is like.

[Schwaib]

At first I never knew the job that I was going to be doing. That's what I can say. Then after like, after like a week they added me funds without anything. They just used to give me funds. Now I had like 40 phones.

[Shabani Matani]

They gave him dozens of SIM cards and all of them were for us numbers.

[Schwaib]

After like a week I started seeing things.

[Shabani Matani]

If they were just doing remote work, why were they in possession of all this stuff like why did they have hundreds of computers, thousands of SIM cards? What was all of it for?

[Aisha Rascoe]

You're listening to the Sunday Story. We'll be right back.

[NPR Sponsor Announcer]

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[Shabani Matani]

By the end of that first week, it all started to click. Schwaib realized that he'd been brought to Cambodia to work as a scammer. And Schwaib, like many of the other Africans there, would be working at the lowest level of the operation.

[Schwaib]

We are specialized in three categories. They were the developers, they were the receptionists, and they were the killers.

[Shabani Matani]

First there were the developers, they were IT technicians and they buy stolen data off the Internet. They get access to troves of phone numbers, Instagram accounts and other data. Then there were the receptionists, like Schwaipe. So were you a receptionist?

[Schwaib]

Yes, I was a receptionist.

[Shabani Matani]

So what does a receptionist do? Schweib explained to me that as a receptionist, he was the first person that a client would be in contact with. That's what the victims were called, by the way, clients. His job was to be that first human touch via text message to introduce clients to basically a profitable scheme. He would lure them bit by bit with real cash rewards.

[Schwaib]

They gave me a script.

[Shabani Matani]

Can you give me an example of what the script will say?

[Schwaib]

First message like, hello, how are you doing? Like a spamming message.

[Shabani Matani]

And then Maybe out of 10 numbers, one person would reply, who is this one?

[Schwaib]

No, that's when I get back to the script. I'm Sarah, as I mentioned earlier, I just copy all of it, then I paste it, then I send.

[NPR Sponsor Announcer]

This is a remote job opportunity. Your main task will be to help improve how products are seen and ranked

[Schwaib]

on big shopping platforms. Copying, pasting. Copying, pasting, following the scripts.

[Shabani Matani]

Yeah, the best part, you don't need Any technical skills or prior experience. So Shuai was in charge of hooking clients into what's called a task scam. And others who I interviewed in Cambodia described how this worked to me as well. As a client, you're convinced that you've signed up for a remote marketing job and that you just have to, like a few YouTube pages, Amazon products. But to get sort of further in and to be given more things to do, you have to deposit money into an account. So you deposit money, you get paid out, you deposit more, they give you more work, you get paid out more and earn commission that way. And this commission structure was sort of deliberately complex. Maybe it was a way to make it seem more real. In the script that Schweib used, there was a section included in it called Personal Conversation. Small tidbits of information that would make someone trust a stranger that they were speaking to, you know, on a social networking platform. In one script, he was Antonella Camboni, an Italian living in California who deeply valued her financial security. In another, he was a 34 year old with a dog named Toby. The tone was never pushy. So I guess most of your clients were American.

[Schwaib]

That was the market that we are in. But some market in the USA market, some it is Canada, some it is Indian, some it is uk, some it is South Africa.

[Shabani Matani]

After Schreib convinced his client to sign up, his goal was to get them to withdraw their money. That was his goal, to get them to withdraw. The client had to see that the scheme was working. They had to gain something from it, you know, so that they would come back and then once they did, once they put in a deposit, withdrew it. Shuai would hand the client up the chain until eventually that client interacted with the killer.

[Schwaib]

But the killers were on with those Chinese. We used to call them killers because what they were doing, they were killing.

[Shabani Matani]

This killer would convince the client to make their very last deposit before emptying out the whole wallet. Schweib said that after each kill, the killers would celebrate.

[Schwaib]

They used to beat the drum like 10 times. Sorry.

[Shabani Matani]

They would beat the drum when somebody get a lot of money.

[Schwaib]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They could be like a drum. Yes, like the Chinese drum. Yeah.

[Shabani Matani]

Schweib said he heard some of the killers boast about how they made a huge kill from a client with a hospitalized kid. He had killers talk about targeting entire communities of retirees.

[Schwaib]

Somebody can say that, I'm so sick, I don't have anything to eat. I've sold my house, I've sold my Car. I don't have anything left. I'm done. I'm done. Then after one week, you hear the same killer is eating the drum. Then you'd be like, what's happening? Maybe those guys, maybe they have some witchcraft.

[Shabani Matani]

Schreib said he considered telling clients he spoke to that this was a scam so they could get out of it. Did you ever think like,

[Schwaib]

did you

[Shabani Matani]

ever feel very, like, emotional or very upset?

[Schwaib]

A lot of times. A lot of times.

[Shabani Matani]

But he and the other workers, they were under constant surveillance.

[Schwaib]

They used to check our phones and they used to do it randomly. If they find out, like you sent anyone a picture of what is going on here. If you send any message concerning about what is going on here, that means it was going to be bad for you.

[Shabani Matani]

Schweib told me there was an isolation room on the fifth floor of the building. And he said everyone knew what happened there.

[Schwaib]

They had some room where they used to torture some guys. It was a small room that was

[Shabani Matani]

where they'd bring in people who did not comply, who tried to escape, who tried to contact NGOs and rescuers who tipped off clients to this being a scam.

[Schwaib]

I never went there, to the isolation, but one of my friends went there like in the deep night, they punish him. After that, they leave him. They could, they could tie him on the bed. Then they come, they beat, they go. The next time they come, they beat again. Now when, when, by the time the guy came back, the guy came back with a face where a lot of wounds. When I saw him, I knew that I was up. That's. That's what I, that's what, that's what came in my head. I said, I'm up and I don't have any way back. Then I was like, ah man, me, I have to go back home.

[Shabani Matani]

These stories of torture, they're consistent with what I'd heard from others who got out of similar compounds. And it's been well documented over the years in NGO reports and US Government reports. Schweib thought he still had his original return ticket, which was for a month after his arrival on that month long tourist visa. But then someone in the compound told him, just forget about that. If you don't finish your contract, you'll owe the bosses about $4,000.

[Schwaib]

I was like, ah man, all my life I never had that money. And he was like, now you have to do everything they tell you.

[Shabani Matani]

He felt trapped.

[Schwaib]

And I knew that. Now this is me. I have only two options is to work and pray so that I can get back home safe.

[Shabani Matani]

Every day he worried about quotas. He'd pray to God for clients.

[Schwaib]

When you can't sleep, you can't eat. When you don't have the clients because you know what is coming.

[Shabani Matani]

If they didn't get clients, they'd have to work longer hours or his monthly salary would be deducted. Bosses, they deducted money for everything. They called them fines. I'd heard from people who worked in other compounds that there were fines for being on the phone for too long, for briefly clicking out of the scam chat window during their 12 hour workday. One rescuer told me that someone she helped was fined because they wanted to sit close to a window. Shuaib was often fined for not getting enough clients. And there were daily expenses to account for too. Schweib is Muslim and he doesn't eat pork. But the cafeteria often served pork. So he went to the company run supermarket to buy snacks. And month after month his wages were whittled down to almost nothing. Schweib worked at night from 10pm to 10am it was a nocturnal schedule because of the time zones. He said the bosses regulated how long he could talk on the phone. Sometimes they took his phone away and gave it back only for a few hours. And they told him he had to keep his phone call short. Just quickly check in with your family, but don't tell them anything about what you do. But if you called your family and told them like, hey, something is wrong.

[Schwaib]

I couldn't tell them because I didn't want them to worry about anything. Because even if I told them, there was nothing they were going to do about it.

[Shabani Matani]

So you didn't tell anybody anything?

[Schwaib]

They never knew anything.

[Shabani Matani]

The guilt ate away at Shreib slowly.

[Schwaib]

I used to get some sleeping pills. I used to purchase them. I used to take two pills. Two pills, two pills, two pills, two pills. Till after some time the two pills were no longer working. I used to sleep for only two hours.

[Shabani Matani]

His prayers started to change. When he'd left Kampala. He brought a Quran with him. But rather than just praying for himself and his escape, when he said his daily prayers, he started praying that the clients who withdrew their profits wouldn't come back. But Schreib said that he gradually came to think it wasn't just the killers who were greedy. He believed the clients themselves were also pulled in by greed.

[Schwaib]

They are greedy. Anyone who is coming is just greedy

[Shabani Matani]

because they should have known the arrangement.

[Schwaib]

It is too good to be true.

[Aisha Rascoe]

This is the Sunday story. Stay with us.

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[Shabani Matani]

So when we say scam company, the word company, it's entirely apt. You can't think of these as sort of scrappy little criminal enterprises or mafia in the jungle. They run like a business. Frontline scammers like Schweib. They're managed by their team leaders who are their direct bosses. Then they have to report up to managers who in turn report to the head of a department. Then there's an HR department which handles recruitment, PR division that handles ads. Those are just the departments inside the compound itself. Outside there's a whole infrastructure to protect and serve the criminal enterprise. There are drivers who bring migrants like Schweib over to the compound, fruit vendors and drink sellers who move to the streets around the compound. So hoping to cash in, there are the security guards who keep watch. And then the land itself that is owned and controlled by tycoons close to the Cambodian government. They profit off the compounds on their land. My sources on the ground, they told me that it's the landlords who maintain a relationship with the police, who tip them off to raids and who keep them protected. In July of 2025, about five months after Schweib arrived in the scam compound, Thailand started attacking Cambodia. The two countries do have long standing border disputes, but later Thai officials claimed they were targeting centers of human trafficking and the scam industry itself. Thais on social media even coined a new term, scambodia. But Cambodia said Thailand's claim that it was waging a war against this quote, scam army was just a pretext to gain control of their territory. Tensions have continued to simmer, though there's a tentative peace deal now. Though Shuai was far from Thailand, his bosses were getting nervous because these clashes near the border prompted Cambodia to announce they were cracking down on the industry. So Schwaib's bosses started shifting him and the other workers around, moving them to new, more isolated compounds. But then in January of this year, a Chinese Cambodian kingpin named Chen TZE was extradited back to China following a criminal indictment in the U.S. the indictment accused Chen of operating forced labor scam compounds in Cambodia. He was arrested in Cambodia, put on a plane with a bag over his head. Chenza operated one of the biggest conglomerates in Cambodia and was allegedly using that as a front for his scam operations. But he was also an advisor to the Cambodian prime minister. Everyone believed he was untouchable. When he went down, scam bosses everywhere started panicking. So Shuai was moved again, this time to a compound called Park 8. But this time, Schwaib and the other traffic migrants, they knew what was going on. They saw it on social media, on their phones. They knew their bosses were in a vulnerable place.

[Schwaib]

And also the rumors that I heard about outside, they are ready. I know that anytime from now.

[Shabani Matani]

And so in late January, roughly two weeks after Schweib arrived in Park 8, a number of workers started to take things into their own hands.

[Schwaib]

We knew that this is our only chance to escape from here.

[Shabani Matani]

They revolted. Schweib says a crowd of people surrounded the Chinese bosses accommodations. Some had sticks and stones.

[Schwaib]

They wanted to beat the bosses badly.

[Shabani Matani]

They demanded to leave.

[Schwaib]

We just want our passports to go.

[Shabani Matani]

The bosses, they were cornered and they gave workers a choice. You can leave or you can come with us to the next scam compound. But if you leave, you'll be out there on your own, on the streets of Cambodia, In a country now hostile to the work that you were brought here to do. Is it worth the risk? Schweib decided he would take his chance.

[Schwaib]

So we were called one by one. One by one, we are given the passports.

[Shabani Matani]

He went outside and quickly flagged down a car. He found a driver willing to take him. He paid about $150 to get to Phnom Penh. On February 1st of this year, Shuai drove away again in the darkness, unclear where he was going and what he would do.

[Aisha Rascoe]

In part two, Shibani Matani picks up Schwaib's story on the streets of Phnom Penh. It was easy to get into Cambodia, but getting out would be much harder. Listen now to part two.

[Schwaib]

Foreign.

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