> It's mostly run by Chinese. (But they scam Chinese too. It originated as scamming older single Chinese ladies, actually.)

This comment suggests that the main target would be non-Chinese, with some incidental Chinese targets/victims. I think the reality is the opposite, and that the primary targets are Chinese, with some incidental Western victims, for the simple reason that both the perpetrators and the (involutary) scam workers are largely far more fluent in Chinese and knowlegable about Chinese financial systems, culture, etc.

Both in mainland China and other countries with large ethnic Chinese populations, there is quite some awareness and media information these issues, e.g.:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_More_Bets

https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/323544...

https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/08/30/1078663/pig-butc...

p.s.: From casual conversations with European friends, there are probably smaller scale "native" versions of such scams in many Western countries. Large scam centers with imprissoned workers might be somewhat specific to Chinese/Cambodia.

No. The Chinese perpetrators might have targeted predominantly Chinese victims originally, but not for quite some time.

First, China has vigorously cracked down on crypto, and secondly, it has engaged in large scale information campaigns and PSA warning about these scams.

The people trapped in the scam centres are often English speakers, such as from the Philippines, India, Hong Kong, anglophone African countries, etc., targeting Western countries, or nationals of the target countries, e.g. Thailand or Vietnam.

The Chinese gangsters, like Russian hackers, now prefer to target foreigners.

If you want to know more, I can recommend the usual books about crypto, the podcast and article series on Scam Inc by The Economist, and Martin Purbrink’s substack.

https://asiacrimecentury.substack.com/

https://asiacrimecentury.substack.com/p/scam-inc-explaining-...

https://asiacrimecentury.substack.com/p/betting-on-chaos-the...