ASEAN members closing ranks as cyberscam threat escalates

https://p.dw.com/p/5IYdC

For years, governments across Southeast Asia largely approached the region’s online fraudsters as a matter for the police, anti-trafficking agencies and border authorities

But these bodies have appearently failed to stem the rise of international cyberscam cartels. The illicit industry is increasingly using international banking systems, cryptocurrencies, telecommunications networks, shell companies and trafficking routes, with some of its centers operating under the protection of armed or politically connected groups

Now, ASEAN governments seem increasingly willing to tackle the threat as a united bloc

Myanmar approves death penalty for cyberscam bosses

Signs of this shift were visible at the controversial meeting in Bangkok on August 6 between Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul and President Min Aung Hlaing, the head of Myanmar’s military government

The two governments agreed to clamp down on scam centers along their shared frontier, exchange information and jointly disrupt criminal financial flows

Thailand also offered support for Myanmar’s participation in the Egmont Group, an international network of financial-intelligence bodies. Myanmar’s military-backed parliament had already voted in favor of applying the death penalty on those caught operating online scam centers

While visiting Cambodia late last month, Indonesian Deputy Foreign Minister Arif Havas Oegroseno also proposed a joint task force to combat online scam syndicates

And last week, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto and Thai Prime Minister Charnvirakul held talks in Jakarta where they agreed their two countries must lead the way and strengthen ASEAN’s resilience against scam groups

Online scams grew into an ‘economic security threat’

A UN estimate published last month put the annual losses from cyber scammers — many of whom are located in Southeast Asia — at between $88.3 billion and $114.1 billion (between €76 billion and €98 billion) globally in 2025

Artificial intelligence, cryptocurrencies, encrypted communications and deepfake technology have made their operations cheaper and harder to detect

“Cyber scams in Southeast Asia have evolved beyond a conventional cybercrime issue and should be viewed as an economic security threat,” Hai Luong, a lecturer at Australia’s Griffith University‘s School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, told DW

Impact of cybercrime felt around the world

Governments in Southeast Asia have already had to respond to pressure from the US, the EU and China as their online cartels drew international attention

In October 2025, the US designated Cambodia’s Prince Group, one of the country’s largest conglomerates, as a transnational criminal organization and imposed sanctions on 146 people and companies connected to it

US authorities also charged Chinese-born Prince Group chairman Chen Zhi with wire fraud and money laundering conspiracies. Cambodia eventually revoked Chen’s citizenship and extradited him to China

Prince Group’s business empire extended across real estate, finance and other sectors in Cambodia. US authorities allege that criminal revenues were mixed with legitimate commercial activities through an international network of companies

Washington has also sanctioned other Southeast Asian individuals and companies accused of investing in scam compounds and laundering money

The EU followed last month, imposing sanctions  on Prince Group and Jin Bei Group in Cambodia and the Democratic Karen Benevolent Army in Myanmar for alleged involvement in cyberscams

Cambodia moves against US-sanctioned banks

In 2024, the United States Institute of Peace estimated that Cambodia’s cyber-scam industry generated more than $12.5 billion annually, equivalent to roughly a third of the country’s formal economy

The collapse of several scam-linked conglomerates has raised concerns about how the economic shockwaves will affect the rest of the country. At the same time, other voices say negative publicity around scamming is hurting the country’s tourism sector and keeping away foreign investors

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet has acknowledged that the illicit scam economy is damaging legitimate businesses and has vowed a systematic crackdown on online scam networks, including greater scrutiny of the financial sector

The National Bank of Cambodia has shuttered at least six financial institutions since the start of 2026. Three commercial banks whose licences were revoked in August had all been sanctioned by the US over alleged links to scam networks

On August 4, the Singaporean government introduced legislation that would expand information-sharing between police and service providers, allow authorities to disable accounts suspected of facilitating scams and strengthen restrictions on financial, telecommunications and online services supplied to suspected offenders

Criminal groups capitalize on government inefficiencies

As ASEAN nations try to clamp down on cybercriminals, the region’s greatest weakness is its fragmentation, Sophal Ear, an associate professor at Arizona State University’s Thunderbird School of Global Management, told DW

“Criminal organizations operate seamlessly across borders while governments continue responding through separate agencies with different mandates and limited coordination,” he said

Ear added that the financial infrastructure used to move and conceal criminal proceeds can often prove more resilient than the law-enforcement architecture designed to dismantle it

What is in ASEAN’s anti-crime plan?

Now, the regional governments seem to be catching on — at least judging by ASEAN’s new Plan of Action in Combating Transnational Crime for 2026–2035

The plan calls for improved intelligence-sharing between national law-enforcement agencies and financial-intelligence units, joint investigations, better cross-border coordination and stronger capacity among anti-money-laundering regulators

ASEAN has also recently established a joint working group to combat money laundering

But ASEAN’s consensus-based system still heavily relies on national governments implementing those commitments and sharing sensitive financial and law-enforcement information

“In practice, governments should prioritize disrupting the financial infrastructure, labor supply chains, technological services and transnational business models that sustain scam operations rather than focusing solely on individual offenders,” said Luong from Griffith University’s School of Criminology and Criminal Justice

Moving beyond money mules

Asha Hemrajani, senior fellow at  Nanyang Technological University’s  S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, agreed that the region needs to take a “holistic, not siloed” approach to attack the entire cyberscam business model

“The shared objective should be to identify and dismantle crime syndicate leadership, financial networks and enabling infrastructure, not just arrest money mules or raid individual scam compounds in Cambodia and Myanmar,” Hemrajani said

This includes official scrutiny of high-risk corporate structures and checking laundering, she added. Hemrajani also recommended ASEAN sanctioning business groups linked to the cyberscam networks, similar to how Washington cut off sanctioned Southeast Asian companies from the entire US economy

Edited by: Darko Janjevic

Source: www.dw.com