Trafficking victims scam under threat of violence
CTV News | An investigation looks into who is making scam calls targeting Canadians and why they seem to be so willing to scam people out of their life savings.
Operation Shamrock’s founder Erin West says many of the scammers committing the crimes are victims of human trafficking. They’re forced to work in Southeast Asia scam call-center compounds and commit the crimes under threat of violence.
West travelled to two cyberfraud compounds in the Philippines in 2025. Video on the Operation Shamrock website shows her touring the compounds, which housed more than 35 buildings designed solely for scamming.
“The torture inside these compounds is extreme. That’s how you motivate people to do something they would not ordinarily want to do.” — Erin West, Operation Shamrock
Many of the trafficking victims are forced to make scam calls 16 hours a day. If they don’t meet quotas or try to escape, they’re beaten and tortured. Amnesty International identified more than 50 such compounds in Cambodia and documented the abuse of workers.
The targeted grooming by scammers is effective. Victims “feel there is something special and different and they have a real opportunity. They’ve been sold a dream and want that dream,” said West.
According to West, social media companies like Meta aren’t doing enough to remove scam content from their platforms.
In its response to CTV News, a Meta spokesperson said, “We don’t want this content on our platforms, and we aggressively fight it using specialized systems to detect celeb-bait, invest heavily in trained review teams, share tips on avoiding scams, and offer tools to report potential violations.”
Meanwhile, the scam industry is growing and expanding globally. Organized crime groups are establishing scam compounds in Latin America and Africa.
Full article: ‘Torture inside these compounds is extreme’: W5 investigates cryptocurrency scams targeting Canadians
In part one of the reporting about crypto scams targeting Canadians, W5 met a woman who was scammed out of $1.7 million, and a man had $600,000 stolen in crypto fraud.
