International Justice Mission (IJM) Australia welcomes the Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones' National Press Club address today highlighting the Australian Government's actions to protect Australians from online scams, but asserts that a comprehensive scams prevention strategy must also tackle scams at the source.
"In many instances, the scam messages that Australians receive – whether romance, investment or marketplace scams – have been sent by workers in Southeast Asia who are being forcibly held against their will and coerced into conducting online scams under threat of severe punishment for non-compliance," IJM Australia Country Director David Braga said.
"Forced scamming" is one of the most complex and fastest-growing forms of modern slavery in the world. According to a 2024 report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights, more than 220,000 people are engaged in online scamming in Cambodia and Myanmar alone – an industry with widespread reports of labour trafficking and abuse.
"The scamming industry has been turbocharged since the pandemic by criminal gangs in Southeast Asia who are trafficking vulnerable migrant workers by deceptive recruitment means and forcing them into criminality through violent coercion in guarded compounds," Mr Braga said.
Scamming is a highly lucrative industry, with the UN Office on Drugs and Crime estimating it to be worth $18 billion in Cambodia alone – approximately half of its GDP. It is also an industry where offenders in countries with weak governance structures are subject to little criminal accountability under local laws.
"IJM has helped remove, care for and support victim identification for over 350 individuals whom we have determined to be victims of forced scamming within scam compounds in Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, the Philippines and Indonesia," Mr Braga said.
"Scamming is not just a financial and social threat to Australians, it is a personal safety threat to the likely tens of thousands of people who are being enslaved in this industry from dozens of countries around the world," Mr Braga said.
"IJM urges the Australian Government to continue to work in collaboration with the private sector to stop scams at the source by targeting the perpetrators who are trafficking migrant job seekers into online scam centres and forcing them into criminality," said Mr Braga.
"We know that government efforts alone will not be successful without the private sector, including tech companies, financial institutions and telcos, which have the mechanisms that can disrupt the continued growth of the global scamming industry," Mr Braga said.
The Australian Government is currently working to establish a code of conduct that will make social media companies, telcos and banks liable to provide compensation, and may be fined if they fail to comply with the requirement to prevent and detect the dissemination of scams.
"IJM commends the Assistant Treasurer's steps to tackle this multi-faceted issue that is affecting Australians as well as trafficked migrant workers in Southeast Asia, and urges the further development of a comprehensive strategy to stop scams at the source."
"A robust prevention strategy must involve the Australian Government and private sector prioritising solutions that disrupt scam bosses' access to trafficked workers and which hold human rights abusers to account under the law."
