Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 1: learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
Speaker 2: my name is Nol.
Speaker 3: They call me Ben. We are joined as always with
Speaker 3: our super producer Andrew the try Force Howard. Most importantly,
Speaker 3: you are here. That makes this the stuff they don't
Speaker 3: want you to know. I suggest we begin with a
Speaker 3: callback Matt Nol. Not too long ago, we explored a
Speaker 3: harrowing story about me Admar, especially the troubled scam industry there,
Speaker 3: and we exercise some empathy. We asked a question a
Speaker 3: lot of people don't ask, which is when you get
Speaker 3: those crazy phone calls, who's on the other line? You know,
Speaker 3: who's on the other end of the phone.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah. And we talked about specifically the geography of
Speaker 2: me and Mar and how many borders it shares with
Speaker 2: other countries where you can just travel across a river
Speaker 2: and now you're in me and Mar that is going
Speaker 2: through all kinds of political turmoil, a very dangerous place
Speaker 2: to be.
Speaker 4: Yeah, what you might call a civil and social and
Speaker 4: governmental unrest. It's some areas being you know, completely lawless.
Speaker 3: And we also we also know, just as you do,
Speaker 3: fellow conspiracy realist, that stories continue long after a headline
Speaker 3: fades from your favorite subreddit or your favorite paper of notes.
Speaker 3: So we kept digging, and tonight we are following up
Speaker 3: on a deeper dive into the active criminal enterprises of
Speaker 3: online scams, not just in Meammar, but around the globe.
Speaker 3: We are joined with the Edward R. Moureau Award winning
Speaker 3: investigative journalist Denise chand Denise, your newest project, Scam Factory,
Speaker 3: explores the real world phenomena of scam compounds, their providence,
Speaker 3: their consequences, the unclean human tool involved. Thank you so
Speaker 3: much for joining us.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I'm so happy to be here with you all,
Speaker 5: and we'll.
Speaker 2: Be right back with Denise after a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 2: We have been listening to Scam Factory, which has, let's say,
Speaker 2: fully humanized the experiences of people who go through the factory,
Speaker 2: people who are affected by loved ones going through the factory.
Speaker 2: It is blowing our minds just as listeners. Can you
Speaker 2: tell us how you came into this project?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean I'm like everybody else who gets a
Speaker 5: bunch of these sort of scam texts, right, They're on
Speaker 5: my phone all the time. And when I discovered that
Speaker 5: the people on the other side of these scam text
Speaker 5: were trapped in these compounds, thousands of them, stuck there,
Speaker 5: forced to scam people fourteen sixteen hours a day, was
Speaker 5: mind blowing and it totally flipped the script of who
Speaker 5: I thought was a scammer and them actually being a victim.
Speaker 5: And I think what is most compelling about Scam Factory
Speaker 5: is that we were able to find a way to
Speaker 5: tell this story that Matt, like you said, is human driven.
Speaker 5: The story takes you inside these scam factories, they take
Speaker 5: you behind the scene with these scammers. But really, at
Speaker 5: the heart of it, it is a family story. It
Speaker 5: is a story about a man, a Filipine man who
Speaker 5: gets tricked into going to memar and his older sister,
Speaker 5: who goes through crazy links, gets wrapped up in the
Speaker 5: scam operations, makes complicated decisions in order to get her
Speaker 5: brother out.
Speaker 4: A very very complex character. If we're going to call
Speaker 4: them characters, this is someone Charlie is not exactly well.
Speaker 4: Charlie in particular, just an absolutely. I don't know, compelling
Speaker 4: kind of case of someone being pulled in multiple directions
Speaker 4: and sort of driven by different allegiances and ultimately I
Speaker 4: don't want to spoil anything, but it's very much put
Speaker 4: to the test.
Speaker 5: And I think that that's what's really exciting about the
Speaker 5: series is that because we get six episodes and we
Speaker 5: get to really deep dive with each of these characters,
Speaker 5: you get to really grapple alongside with these characters around
Speaker 5: this moral question of would I harm people I don't
Speaker 5: know in order to save my myself or to say,
Speaker 5: the people that I love.
Speaker 3: It's a trolley problem in a way, you know, ethically
Speaker 3: fraught and denise. One thing I love that you're pointing
Speaker 3: out here is there's an exploration for the people on
Speaker 3: the other side of the cold phone call. They themselves
Speaker 3: have become scammed into scamming, if it's fair to say.
Speaker 3: And with this, before we really dive in, we have
Speaker 3: to acknowledge your award winning work on previous projects so
Speaker 3: cal connected. I was there podcasts like fed Up and
Speaker 3: over my Dead Body and.
Speaker 2: Don't forget until it happened to us.
Speaker 4: All right?
Speaker 3: Always remember that one. Also, can you tell us how
Speaker 3: you initially discovered this story, like what drew you to it?
Speaker 5: Thank you for pointing out my previous work. Yeah, so
Speaker 5: my previous background was in investigative documentaries. I've actually done
Speaker 5: a lot of stories primarily domestically focused. So having the
Speaker 5: opportunity to do an international story, to bring a story
Speaker 5: that's overseas two US audiences, was always on my bucket list.
Speaker 5: So this is why Scam Factory is very special and
Speaker 5: unique milestone for me personally. But how I found this story,
Speaker 5: it was unexpected. Actually, you know, once I heard that
Speaker 5: these people, once I've learned the truth about who was
Speaker 5: behind these scam texts, I immediately wanted to talk to
Speaker 5: people who had escaped from these compounds. And at the time,
Speaker 5: we had heard about two people who had just been
Speaker 5: rescued a couple days prior and made it back to Bangkok,
Speaker 5: and so we scheduled an interview to talk to them,
Speaker 5: and those two individuals turned out to be Max and
Speaker 5: Jing Wow. And as we're sitting there talking to Max
Speaker 5: and Jane, we noticed that Max it keeps looking at
Speaker 5: a woman sitting on the side, and we don't realize
Speaker 5: until the recorder is off that that person is actually Charlie,
Speaker 5: his older sister. And it wasn't until after that when
Speaker 5: we began to have conversations with Charlie that we realized, oh,
Speaker 5: Charlie not only helped bring Max out, but she actually
Speaker 5: played an even bigger role without giving any spoilers, that
Speaker 5: made her really the center of this entire story. So
Speaker 5: that is how we ended up finding finding the story,
Speaker 5: finding these siblings. And as we just kept pulling that thread,
Speaker 5: it was, it just kept graveling and it became a
Speaker 5: wilder and wilder tail as.
Speaker 4: You'll learn what luck I mean, I know there's more
Speaker 4: to it than luck, but for your first you know
Speaker 4: source that you discover to be at the center of
Speaker 4: what is not just a kind of a teachable moment
Speaker 4: for this kind of thing and sort of an explanation
Speaker 4: of what is on the other side, but just an
Speaker 4: absolute twisting, turning story of intrigue and just you know,
Speaker 4: kind of the humanity of it adds it's incredible that
Speaker 4: was you found those folks so quickly and all at
Speaker 4: the same time.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I will add that, you know, it wasn't the
Speaker 5: Max and Jay weren't definitely they were the first sources
Speaker 5: that we spoke to coming out as Highland, but we
Speaker 5: had talked to other sources stuff until that point. But
Speaker 5: the thing about Wondering is that we're always trying to
Speaker 5: find the most unique way into the story. And once
Speaker 5: we heard about Charlie and Max's journey, the sibling story,
Speaker 5: we were like, Okay, this is going to be a
Speaker 5: compelling way in for listeners to universally understand what these
Speaker 5: individuals are going through.
Speaker 2: So let's jump to the first episode of the series.
Speaker 2: When we're thinking about Charlie and Max. As you know
Speaker 2: sister brother Charlie, the older sister who feels very protective
Speaker 2: over Max. How does Max get introduced to the concept
Speaker 2: of whatever it is that he thinks he's going to
Speaker 2: go and do to make some money, Like what does
Speaker 2: that value offer to him? And then how does he
Speaker 2: get sucked in? And how does Charlie help him get there?
Speaker 5: So Max hears about this job offer through a couple
Speaker 5: of his friends who have been I think originally they
Speaker 5: were going to work in Cambodia and he hears about
Speaker 5: this opportunity. He thinks, oh my gosh, my friends are
Speaker 5: out there, they seem to be doing fine. I want
Speaker 5: to work this job that one falls through. He gets
Speaker 5: another offer to go to Bangkok, and this is the
Speaker 5: one that we hear in the series, and he's talking
Speaker 5: to a lot of his friends. They all seem like, oh,
Speaker 5: this is a great job. Yeah, come come, come, come come,
Speaker 5: and they're selling him on everything. You know, They're selling
Speaker 5: him on amenities like room and board. Everything is paid for,
Speaker 5: you get food, you get all these The supermarkets are there.
Speaker 5: Everything is there, so you don't even have to leave
Speaker 5: the compounds, so you're all good. You can just stay there.
Speaker 5: And obviously, like we say in this series, Max is
Speaker 5: at home driving his family car. It's not it's not
Speaker 5: making a ton of money. So when he hears he's
Speaker 5: making maybe two hundred and fifty dollars a month. And
Speaker 5: so when he hears a job opportunity to go abroad
Speaker 5: and make one thousand dollars a month, that could be
Speaker 5: game changing for him. And so that's what initially appeals
Speaker 5: to him. It's like, yes, I'm going to go abroad
Speaker 5: for a year and work and be away from my family.
Speaker 5: But hey, on the other side, I'll be able to
Speaker 5: give them a way better standard of living if I
Speaker 5: can get this this income. So that's Initially what brings
Speaker 5: him in, Well, what does.
Speaker 2: He think he's going to do with that job? Like,
Speaker 2: what is the actual job itself?
Speaker 5: He thinks that he is going over there to do
Speaker 5: It's like an online casino gig, and so he thinks
Speaker 5: he's going over there to do It's almost like the
Speaker 5: loaders on online casinos, where you do customer service with
Speaker 5: people who are gambling, and so he thinks that's what
Speaker 5: the job is going to be. It's customer service, it's
Speaker 5: back end, and that's it.
Speaker 3: In totally legit and super above board, definitely not involved
Speaker 3: with any sort of triad. The sarcasm goes so real quick, Denise,
Speaker 3: Let's let's walk through this experience. So we are Max, right,
Speaker 3: we are working a pretty not amazing job, we're making
Speaker 3: ends meet, and we receive an offer to travel abroad.
Speaker 3: We sign a contract telling us we will work back
Speaker 3: end an online casino gig. Where do we find the
Speaker 3: plot twist? What happens to Max when he agrees to
Speaker 3: take up this job offer.
Speaker 5: So Max is a sign a contract. But one of
Speaker 5: the things I want to emphasize is, like, one of
Speaker 5: the things that is really sinister about the entire thing
Speaker 5: is that. You'll hear it in the first scene where
Speaker 5: they go to a mall and these criminal syndicate bosses
Speaker 5: will come, the recruiters will come, and they'll have lunch
Speaker 5: with you. They'll they'll make it seem as legitimate as possible,
Speaker 5: that this is all good. They'll answer every single question
Speaker 5: that you have, they'll try to sell you on it.
Speaker 4: You're almost flattered by it, right because you're coming from
Speaker 4: a place where maybe you aren't given that kind of respect,
Speaker 4: and you're being treated like you're potentially an asset for
Speaker 4: this new operation, and there's got to be a certain
Speaker 4: sense of like pride that they're giving either maybe you
Speaker 4: are lacking in your normal life.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and it feels like, you know, you'll hear it
Speaker 5: in the series where Max goes to this restaurant and
Speaker 5: it's a fancy restaurant, a restaurant they normally wouldn't go to,
Speaker 5: and everything is paid for. In the back of their mind,
Speaker 5: it feels really legitimate, like, oh, Okay, these people have money,
Speaker 5: this company has money, this is gonna be great. So
Speaker 5: and Charlie is at that lunch. Charlie is convinced herself.
Speaker 5: She feels like she's done all the vetting that she
Speaker 5: could do. She has asked all the questions. She feels
Speaker 5: like it's legitimate, so she lets Max go. So yeah,
Speaker 5: After their luncheon, Max is convinced. Max is very excited.
Speaker 5: Charlie actually also has the opportunity to get the opportunity
Speaker 5: a free flight to go and check out the compound herself.
Speaker 5: I mean, all of this seems above board on her end.
Speaker 5: She goes over to the campus. She sees, Oh, okay,
Speaker 5: everything looks legitimate, like all the amenities are exactly as
Speaker 5: they said. She takes a look at the dorms, She
Speaker 5: takes a look at the office, She looks at people's screens, sees, oh,
Speaker 5: they are doing online gambling. She comes back, tells Max,
Speaker 5: we're good to go. I think you're okay, And so
Speaker 5: Max goes and he's very excited. He flies over to
Speaker 5: Bangkok and very quickly realizes something isn't right because Bangkok
Speaker 5: should only be about forty five minutes away from the airport,
Speaker 5: and as he's driving, it becomes longer and longer and longer,
Speaker 5: and something starts to dawn on him. But it is
Speaker 5: not right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't want to spoil it too much, but
Speaker 2: imagine being like just being shuffled into a vehicle, right,
Speaker 2: you think you're going forty five minutes, then it turns
Speaker 2: into five hours, and then they're like, hey, get out,
Speaker 2: we're going to stay at this hotel for a few hours.
Speaker 2: And were here it kill it.
Speaker 4: I mean, all that kind of too speaks to the
Speaker 4: nature of a scam and this idea of keeping people
Speaker 4: hanging on kind of hoping for the next thing or
Speaker 4: the positive thing that was promised. You'd make a really
Speaker 4: good comparison in the first episode that I think a
Speaker 4: lot of people can understand about the way car salesman op.
Speaker 4: I actually just bought a car, so it's home for me.
Speaker 4: But it's the idea that they kind of keep you
Speaker 4: captive in a way and make you all these promises
Speaker 4: and answer all your questions and make everything seem legitimate,
Speaker 4: and then when you're kind of out of it or exhausted,
Speaker 4: that's when they kind of pull the bait and switch
Speaker 4: or whatever. You know. I mean, not all car salesmen
Speaker 4: are like that, but can you maybe speak a little
Speaker 4: bit to the mechanics of a scam, Maybe not the
Speaker 4: specific scam, but just how that promise and that whole
Speaker 4: relationship kind of plays into how things can really quickly
Speaker 4: spin out of control.
Speaker 5: I think what's interesting is the whole tactic, especially with
Speaker 5: folks like Max and Jane who get tricked into going
Speaker 5: to MEMR. They are constantly reassured even in the car,
Speaker 5: like as they're texting the recruiter, Oh, no, it's fine,
Speaker 5: this is exactly what's happening. Don't worry. And they'll try
Speaker 5: and ask questions, be like, hey, where where are we going?
Speaker 5: And the driver will say no English, no English. So
Speaker 5: it's sort of it's a stressful and yet confusing period.
Speaker 5: But also you have no choice but to trust the
Speaker 5: only person, the only contact you have, oftentimes it's the recruiter,
Speaker 5: And so the recruiter is telling you, oh, it's good,
Speaker 5: it's good, it's good, and so you really, what are
Speaker 5: you going to do? You can't just like open the
Speaker 5: door and just like roll out of the car. Right.
Speaker 5: It's a very scary situation, and they purposely kind of
Speaker 5: put people in that in that scenario so they can't escape,
Speaker 5: and they all they can do is hope that they're
Speaker 5: telling the truth, and obviously they're not telling the truth
Speaker 5: about where they're going.
Speaker 4: Well, and even beyond that, like physical safety aspect, there
Speaker 4: is also that promise of future payment, future deliverables, and
Speaker 4: you're like, oh, if I jump out now, or if
Speaker 4: I get out now, or if I ask to be
Speaker 4: dropped off, then I won't get this opportunity. And that's
Speaker 4: part of the kind of mind games that are being
Speaker 4: played with you by this recruiter as well.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I mean even once they get into the compound,
Speaker 5: it's like the goals post keeps moving, you know. It's
Speaker 5: it's they'll say, oh, just work one year, and then
Speaker 5: maybe once you get to the one year, who knows
Speaker 5: if they're lying or not. They could keep you for
Speaker 5: longer or just meet this quota. And then once you
Speaker 5: meet this quota, uh, and and you hit a certain number,
Speaker 5: the quota might change. The quota might suddenly be like okay,
Speaker 5: the bosses might suddenly say, hey, yeah, we said you
Speaker 5: could work until this amount of money. However, because of
Speaker 5: how you lived, you now owe x amount and so
Speaker 5: therefore what you're trying to get at is now a
Speaker 5: higher price. So these are just things that they do
Speaker 5: to make sure you're stuck there and with.
Speaker 2: That will take a quick break and be right back.
Speaker 1: And we're back.
Speaker 3: Can we describe, just for everyone tuning in a bit
Speaker 3: of the working conditions. So we're putting ourselves in Max's place.
Speaker 3: Right in the story, we have our sibling Charlie, who
Speaker 3: is very increasingly concerned. Right, we're Max, what are our
Speaker 3: average like day to day working conditions looking like? How
Speaker 3: is our life there?
Speaker 5: So inside these compounds, it's kind of bizarre because, and
Speaker 5: I will be honest, when I first heard about these places,
Speaker 5: it felt unreal that these places would exist. They are
Speaker 5: almost like micro cities. There are places where there's high
Speaker 5: rise buildings full of dorms, offices, and there's casinos, there's hotels,
Speaker 5: there's streets full of restaurants, there are karaoke bars, so
Speaker 5: it feels like a mini city. Obviously, as a low
Speaker 5: level worker, somebody like Max or Jane in the story,
Speaker 5: you're not allowed to necessarily go to some of these places.
Speaker 5: Those areas of pleasure are oftentimes for the bosses. So
Speaker 5: for workers like Max, really you are confined to either
Speaker 5: the dorms or the office and you just basically go
Speaker 5: from one place to the next, and there are guards
Speaker 5: everywhere at all the entrants. Oftentimes there are armed guards.
Speaker 5: You're heavily monitored when you're working in the office. You
Speaker 5: have to turn in your phones before you start work,
Speaker 5: and so the bosses are looking through what you're sending
Speaker 5: to people. So Max had to be very very careful
Speaker 5: about what he was sending out. There are cameras everywhere
Speaker 5: inside these inside the offices, just watching people, making sure
Speaker 5: you're working. I've also heard from sources of guards just
Speaker 5: walking up and down the aisles as people are sitting
Speaker 5: at their desk, just to make sure they are working.
Speaker 5: Everything that they type on their computer is also monitored
Speaker 5: by the bosses, so if you go off script, for instance,
Speaker 5: the bosses will know, and so every single move you
Speaker 5: make is watched. And then there's this immense pressure to
Speaker 5: meet scam quotas. So Max and Jane told me that
Speaker 5: their daily quota was about two thousand dollars a day.
Speaker 5: Their team quota was twenty five thousand dollars a day,
Speaker 5: and that's a team of thirteen people. So you divide
Speaker 5: that by thirteen, it's two thousand dollars a day.
Speaker 3: So you can only imagine that US dollars.
Speaker 5: US dollars, so you can only imagine the amount of
Speaker 5: money that's coming into these places, and if they don't
Speaker 5: meet a certain quota, If they don't hit quota, there's punishment.
Speaker 5: There's punishment like starvation, there's punishment like physical beatings, tortures
Speaker 5: over time, things like that.
Speaker 2: So wow, it just sounds so impossible that it could
Speaker 2: be real, especially to get in to that situation the
Speaker 2: way that Max well, and we don't spoil too much,
Speaker 2: but all of the people that we follow in the
Speaker 2: story end up in that position. I've heard of many
Speaker 2: different types of scams. The one that is described that
Speaker 2: they are performing is it was weird and different to
Speaker 2: me that I just didn't I couldn't comprehend how they
Speaker 2: would end up making money as scammers in this way
Speaker 2: until you spell it out. I'd love to just describe
Speaker 2: that a little bit. I don't know if it's specifically
Speaker 2: called hotel hub or deal smashers or those things, but
Speaker 2: it's this concept of roping somebody in through hotel reviews
Speaker 2: and a complicated system of then that person putting money
Speaker 2: back into the system to get money out. Can you
Speaker 2: just describe some of that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think I was also a little confused about
Speaker 4: like the negative balance aspect of it. And how that works.
Speaker 4: That would be super awesome if you could walk us
Speaker 4: through it, because it's fascinating.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was. I mean, I'll be honest, I was
Speaker 5: confusing when I first heard when I first heard of
Speaker 5: this scam as well, because they also use interesting terms.
Speaker 5: They call them customers and clients. They use terminology that's
Speaker 5: really interesting, and I actually think part of that is
Speaker 5: to make the workers feel like they're conducting legitimate business
Speaker 5: in a way. It's psychological, right, the way that you frame.
Speaker 3: It's weaponized language, right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, So, Brillian, I think all of this is it's
Speaker 5: all part of if you get any of these recruitment texts,
Speaker 5: I think there's a lot of I've been getting a
Speaker 5: lot of like, hey, are you looking for part time job?
Speaker 5: I'm from a recruiting agency. And so the scam that
Speaker 5: we talked about in this series specifically is a hotel
Speaker 5: booking scam. So they pretend that they are from almost
Speaker 5: like a hotel rating company that is asking people to
Speaker 5: just for part time gig. Hey review a few hotels
Speaker 5: for me, and we will give you some commission, will
Speaker 5: throw us a couple dollars your way. Super easy work,
Speaker 5: Sit on your couch, just rate some hotels. At some point,
Speaker 5: the hook comes when they are asked to start to
Speaker 5: write reviews for these hotels. And in order to write reviews,
Speaker 5: you have to make some sort of hotel booking. And
Speaker 5: in order to make the hotel booking, you put in
Speaker 5: your money first, and then you'll be able to get
Speaker 5: your money back out afterwards. In doing so, by putting
Speaker 5: your money in upfront, you are allowing yourself to make
Speaker 5: an even bigger commission. It is kind of confusing, but
Speaker 5: I think what the scam does a really good job
Speaker 5: of is that the scammer is trying to reassure you, Hey,
Speaker 5: this complicated thing, don't worry. I'm going to simplify it
Speaker 5: for you. All you got to do is just throw
Speaker 5: the money in and like, don't even worry about how
Speaker 5: this all works.
Speaker 4: All you got to know, I'll help you out. I'll
Speaker 4: actually like, I'm your advocate here, You're.
Speaker 3: With you exactly, it's you and me as a team,
Speaker 3: right exactly.
Speaker 5: All you got to do just put in the money.
Speaker 5: I can just reassure you that you'll get even more
Speaker 5: money back. And so at this point, I mean that's
Speaker 5: the heart of the scam, where you like start to
Speaker 5: develop a relationship with your scammer or your recruiter, you
Speaker 5: think that they're looking out for you, and so you
Speaker 5: start to believe, Okay, so far they have helped me
Speaker 5: make a lot of money, so I have no reason
Speaker 5: to not trust them at this moment in time, even
Speaker 5: though I don't fully understand how this all works. And
Speaker 5: so they'll put money in and know, like you were asking,
Speaker 5: the negative balance comes up again where it's like, oh,
Speaker 5: you know what, for some reason, it's a negative balance,
Speaker 5: but don't worry. Just put more money in and you'll
Speaker 5: get an even bigger reward at the end. And so
Speaker 5: it's sort of like this cyclical thing. It doesn't fully
Speaker 5: make sense, but I do think the heart of it
Speaker 5: is that there's a level of trust. You trust that
Speaker 5: this person you're talking to knows exactly what they're doing.
Speaker 5: They understand the platform better than you. So the report
Speaker 5: they're looking out for you for sure.
Speaker 2: Well it makes me think about the gig economy that
Speaker 2: we all exist in now, where everybody is looking for
Speaker 2: a second or third thing they can do on the
Speaker 2: side to make just enough money to live right, to
Speaker 2: be able to afford life. In twenty twenty five. And
Speaker 2: this concept of picking up something on the side and
Speaker 2: then just you know, doing reviews, doing rating, maybe even
Speaker 2: delivering something. That kind of thing just is so regular,
Speaker 2: that is just life.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: I can see how people would get sucked in really easily.
Speaker 5: And the fact that it's remote, right, I feel like
Speaker 5: everybody in these days are looking for they're looking for
Speaker 5: remote work to do something quick and easy, make a
Speaker 5: couple of bucks. And it's not like you're going to
Speaker 5: make a huge salary from this, but hey, a couple
Speaker 5: of hundred bucks helping something, yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Well, and I guess maybe the irony too, is
Speaker 4: that the person that's running that scam and that is
Speaker 4: creating that rapport with the customer or whatever the per
Speaker 4: that's being scammed, they themselves, the person running it, have
Speaker 4: a relationship that is similarly toxic and like Stockholm syndrome
Speaker 4: with their captors, right, and where they're incentivized and they
Speaker 4: are able to somehow mentally in order to just deal
Speaker 4: with the trauma of all of this, normalize all of
Speaker 4: this in order to kind of keep from going nuts.
Speaker 4: I mean, that's just it's mind blowing the idea that
Speaker 4: you know you are having to do this to a person.
Speaker 4: You speak to multiple people who have executed these games,
Speaker 4: and they feel remorse, But in the moment, you're like
Speaker 4: doing what you're told, and you're also maybe even a
Speaker 4: little bit trying to do a good job, and maybe
Speaker 4: you're also kind of good at it. It's fascinating. Yeah,
Speaker 4: that's what psychology of it all.
Speaker 5: It's really twisted to be put in that sort of
Speaker 5: position where you want.
Speaker 6: To succeed and hit target because of the environment you're in,
Speaker 6: but at the same time you're very clear what you're
Speaker 6: doing and you're manipulating the person on the other end, and.
Speaker 5: When the killing day comes, when you are actually scamming them. Yeah,
Speaker 5: the rug pull where you realize where they realize, oh,
Speaker 5: I'm not getting that money back. They feel it a lot,
Speaker 5: and you know, Max is just you hear it in
Speaker 5: the series, a lot of these characters really have a
Speaker 5: tough time grappling with that.
Speaker 4: They're cleaning out elderly people's savings and things like that
Speaker 4: as well. I mean, this is very it's the most
Speaker 4: kind of predatory.
Speaker 3: Also under threat. Right. The people perceived by the end mark, right,
Speaker 3: are themselves being scammed through the establishment of manipulation and
Speaker 3: rapport a cycle, as you said, Denise, of scam all
Speaker 3: the way down. One of the questions that a lot
Speaker 3: of folks are going to be asking when they hear
Speaker 3: our conversation now is well, hey, what if I am
Speaker 3: one of these people built into traveling to me and
Speaker 3: mar right, and I realize stuff is not on the
Speaker 3: up and up and I want to get out.
Speaker 4: What do I do?
Speaker 3: Is it possible for me to get out from under
Speaker 3: the thumb of this scam industry? What happens in that case?
Speaker 5: It's very scary to be in a place like Memmr
Speaker 5: where it is lawless and it's not easy to have
Speaker 5: access to law enforcement.
Speaker 4: Communications are monitored as well. I mean you are and
Speaker 4: there's like guards, there's this whole shoot to kill. It's
Speaker 4: almost like trying to stage a prison break or something
Speaker 4: at a certain point.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, exactly exactly. It's very hard to reach out.
Speaker 5: I will say, if you are in a situation like that,
Speaker 5: try your best to reach out to your embassy in
Speaker 5: the area. Yes, I think that is the number one
Speaker 5: place where they could possibly do something, to go through
Speaker 5: perhaps the appropriate channels. In the series, we talked to
Speaker 5: Colonel Mattalog who is the police attache in Thailand, and
Speaker 5: he is from the Philippines embassy, and so that was
Speaker 5: a really critical resource for Filipinos, the Philippine Embassy in Bangkok.
Speaker 5: So depending on what country you are from, I would
Speaker 5: say that is the first place to reach out to.
Speaker 4: Not the hero of our story in anyways, your story.
Speaker 2: I don't want to I don't want to spoil too much,
Speaker 2: but the concept that these each, each individual person is
Speaker 2: a foreign worker working in me and Mar for a company, right,
Speaker 2: and then mean More has this thing and I don't
Speaker 2: know if this is right or not. I was just
Speaker 2: doing some digging after listening to one of the episodes,
Speaker 2: but I found a thing called the Me and Mar
Speaker 2: Center for Responsible Business Complaints and Grievance, which is really
Speaker 2: interesting and I don't know if it's actually directly related
Speaker 2: to the story here, but it is a system set
Speaker 2: up to where foreign companies operating in Meanmar are monitored
Speaker 2: to some extent, not really but to some extent, right,
Speaker 2: and then you're able to lodge a complaint as an
Speaker 2: employee of one of these foreign companies and say, hey,
Speaker 2: my human rights are being violated in one way or another.
Speaker 2: Here is how I need help. How is that real?
Speaker 2: How does that function?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: What is a complaint desk?
Speaker 5: Yes? If it sounds bizarre, right that the place it does,
Speaker 5: a place that's completely flawless and wild, would have some
Speaker 5: sort of complaint desk.
Speaker 3: It's like HRR, better business.
Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly, it's it's insane. And I remember feeling that
Speaker 5: exact same way when I heard about it. I'm like, wait,
Speaker 5: are you guys playing my leg here like they're you
Speaker 5: could just feel like, hi, sorry, I have a complaint.
Speaker 5: So yeah, So these compounds are actually run by a
Speaker 5: group called the Border Guard Forces, and the Border Guard
Speaker 5: Forces basically control the land that these compounds are on.
Speaker 5: And so what that means is these Chinese syndicates that
Speaker 5: are opening these start these compounds, they're not the actual
Speaker 5: owners of the place. They're leasing the land from the
Speaker 5: group like Border Guard Forces. And so the Border Guard Forces,
Speaker 5: from our reporting, there's really not a level of loyalty
Speaker 5: necessarily to their Chinese tenants. It's more so, hey, we're
Speaker 5: letting you use this land. Don't give us any trouble.
Speaker 5: And so I think a desk like this complaint desk
Speaker 5: that exists in these compounds is their way of making sure. Hey,
Speaker 5: we're we're doing our job. Like you know, if anybody
Speaker 5: has any human rights complaints, they can come to this
Speaker 5: plaint desk and just file it. That said, in the series,
Speaker 5: when you know Colonel advises people to go to this
Speaker 5: complaint desk, he is very clear that it's not a
Speaker 5: foresure that just because you go to this complaint desk
Speaker 5: you will get out. There is a lot of negotiation,
Speaker 5: back and back channeling that is done in order to
Speaker 5: get these people out. However, step one is to at
Speaker 5: least just flag to the complaint desk. Hey, my embassy
Speaker 5: knows that I am here, and they know that I
Speaker 5: want to get out and there's a violation on my
Speaker 5: human rights. I don't want to work here. I want
Speaker 5: to get out.
Speaker 3: Are there any have you encountered any fears of reprisal
Speaker 3: for people reaching out to that complaint desk?
Speaker 4: Gosh, there have to be at least the threat of it, right,
Speaker 4: And don't the employers get a day in court to
Speaker 4: answer for their supposed crimes as well? Like they kind
Speaker 4: of show up, don't they? Isn't that part of it?
Speaker 5: Yeah, Colonel is very clear when people go to the
Speaker 5: complaint desk, don't leave. The complaint desk area is a
Speaker 5: physical area. It's right, right, It's almost it's like when
Speaker 5: you're playing tag, there's like a safe zone base. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 5: the safe base. So it's essentially like that. It's like,
Speaker 5: don't leave, don't don't let them convince you to go
Speaker 5: back to the dorms. Because there have been situations where
Speaker 5: the bosses are so convincing they go, hey, no, just
Speaker 5: go back. We can talk about it back in the dorms,
Speaker 5: and they get brutally beaten and their chances of even
Speaker 5: getting out again are very limited.
Speaker 4: Well, sometimes they go to the desk after having already
Speaker 4: been brutally beaten with signs of that kind of violence,
Speaker 4: and yet there's still situations where they might be enticed
Speaker 4: to go back. It just speaks to the absolute, you know,
Speaker 4: Jedi level mind games that these folks are playing.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4: Hey, what do you say we take a quick break here,
Speaker 4: a word from our sponsors, and then get right back
Speaker 4: into this conversation about scam Factory, and we've returned at
Speaker 4: this point.
Speaker 3: A lot of us listening now will wonder why this
Speaker 3: practice continues, indeed, why this practice seems to have not
Speaker 3: been in any way addressed nor in any actionable way
Speaker 3: controlled to preserve the safety of these people who get
Speaker 3: scammed in to scamming. So we have to ask why
Speaker 3: why is no one stopping this?
Speaker 4: It's not even reported that widely. I hadn't heard about
Speaker 4: it until we did a strange news segment about it
Speaker 4: on the show. And this is very much Ben's wheelhouse
Speaker 4: with international affairs and such. But I just don't feel
Speaker 4: like it gets much traction in the American media, you know,
Speaker 4: outside of your incredible series. It seems like a really
Speaker 4: off the beaten path kind of story that a lot
Speaker 4: of folks are absolutely clueless about.
Speaker 5: I think what often happens here in the US when
Speaker 5: we report on these stories, it's usually from the standpoint
Speaker 5: of the victim, right, the victim who gets the text
Speaker 5: and ends up getting scammed. And so, you know, the
Speaker 5: goal of telling the story from the perspective of the
Speaker 5: scammers is, to Michael, was to really show how connected
Speaker 5: we all are. Right, this is a story, Yes, it's
Speaker 5: a human trafficking story that's happening all the way in
Speaker 5: memr and it feels very very far away, and yet
Speaker 5: these same people are very much so connected to us
Speaker 5: over here, just simply through a text message. So that
Speaker 5: human rights story that's happening over there is very much
Speaker 5: something that we should all pay attention over here in
Speaker 5: the US. But to your point then that what is happening?
Speaker 5: What like, is anybody doing anything about this situation? You know,
Speaker 5: these contents have existed for quite some time now. I
Speaker 5: could started somewhere during the pandemic when it started to
Speaker 5: really pick up. But it's been kind of exciting is
Speaker 5: a weird word to use, but you know, I will
Speaker 5: I will say that there's been a lot of renewed
Speaker 5: attention on these scam compounds. I don't know if you've
Speaker 5: heard recently. Earlier this year, there was news of a
Speaker 5: Chinese actor who had been tricked. He thought he was
Speaker 5: going for a casting call in Bangkok and he ended
Speaker 5: up being in one of these compounds in Memar, and
Speaker 5: that made huge news. And in addition to that, there
Speaker 5: was also another Hong Kong pop star. His name is
Speaker 5: Easan Chan. He was scheduled to have a concert in
Speaker 5: Bangkok and he canceled it because he was scared that
Speaker 5: fans were going to be abducted and taken into Meammar
Speaker 5: to these scam compounds, and so both of those events
Speaker 5: really just shine new light on the topic. And as
Speaker 5: a result of that, there's been a lot of pressure
Speaker 5: on the leaders of China and Thailand to do something
Speaker 5: about it. And so in the last month in February,
Speaker 5: we're seeing a lot of motion, like a lot of activity.
Speaker 5: We saw Thailand shut off power in some of the
Speaker 5: towns in Memmr for where these compounds are held. Just
Speaker 5: last week. Okay, so I don't know when this is
Speaker 5: going to air, but last week of February, the compounds,
Speaker 5: a couple of compounds released about seven thousand people wow
Speaker 5: out and so right now as we're speaking, they're all
Speaker 5: hanging out in Memmar waiting to be repatriated back to
Speaker 5: their perspective countries. And so that's huge. Seven thousand people
Speaker 5: is a lot, and so it's going to be exciting
Speaker 5: to see what other new developments are coming out, how
Speaker 5: many are more are being released, and so on and
Speaker 5: so forth. And actually KK Park, which is one of
Speaker 5: the scam factories that we feature in our series, they
Speaker 5: released I don't have an exact number, but they released
Speaker 5: quite a number of people part of that seven thousand.
Speaker 2: That's anyone who is a regular listener of this show.
Speaker 2: That's one of the ones we highlighted KK Park in
Speaker 2: our previous episode on this whole situation.
Speaker 4: I think I was taking it back by that because
Speaker 4: it literally is like a very professional seeming office park,
Speaker 4: you know, but specifically designed for this very you know,
Speaker 4: nefarious purpose.
Speaker 3: And folks, real quick, the Chinese actor we're referencing there
Speaker 3: is Wong Shinging. I think, so this is getting more
Speaker 3: and more international attention. Thousands of people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, let's get a sense of scale here. This
Speaker 2: is from reporting from The Guardian as of just a
Speaker 2: couple of days ago. They're estimating around one hundred and
Speaker 2: twenty thousand people across me mmr are in this situation,
Speaker 2: living in a compound like this, forced to work in
Speaker 2: this type of this type of job in that situation.
Speaker 2: There's another one hundred thousand and estimated in Cambodia who
Speaker 2: are having to do this. And you know, that's just
Speaker 2: two countries where this type of stuff is happening. And
Speaker 2: so you imagine seven thousand people is so many human
Speaker 2: beings that are saved, but then there's so much work
Speaker 2: left to do.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and there are just you'll hear news like this,
Speaker 5: but then you'll hear, oh there's a new scam compound
Speaker 5: being built in Dubai. Oh there are new compounds being
Speaker 5: built in Africa, in South America. So it's it's like
Speaker 5: whack a mole, right, you can't the hydra, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 5: you can't kill them off.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I just I don't know. I get
Speaker 4: so many scam calls, it's kind of ridiculous, and it
Speaker 4: seems like it's gotten just worse and worse, and the
Speaker 4: types of scams just seem to keep shifting, Like I
Speaker 4: get this one all the time. Now that's saying that
Speaker 4: they need more information for this loan that I applied for,
Speaker 4: and it's their underwriting department and I get it.
Speaker 3: Spoiler, folks, Noel did not actually apply.
Speaker 4: It did not. But it's indifferent voices, they leave messages,
Speaker 4: it comes from all kinds of area codes, and it's
Speaker 4: coming from this very uniform seeming script. So that's just
Speaker 4: one that I've been inundated with. And I just wonder
Speaker 4: if you have any thoughts about the are things like
Speaker 4: that coming from these types of compounds as well? Is
Speaker 4: that a red flag? The idea that it's the scripted
Speaker 4: thing with different voices, maybe with spoofed numbers, or how
Speaker 4: do they reach us, you know, with this kind of stuff,
Speaker 4: and how do you see the evolution of these types
Speaker 4: of scams even as governments take action and close some
Speaker 4: of these places down.
Speaker 5: I don't know for sure if all of the calls
Speaker 5: are from these scam centers. I wouldn't be surprised right now,
Speaker 5: from what I've heard of from my sources is that
Speaker 5: there's a big focus on AI anybody like AI talent
Speaker 5: because you know, as you can imagine, if you can
Speaker 5: use AI to talk to people, not rely on people
Speaker 5: trans late to chat with people, like, it's only going
Speaker 5: to become more and more realistic, and that's really scary. Yes,
Speaker 5: So that, like, I wouldn't surprise me that they're doing
Speaker 5: things like that, But that only means we should all
Speaker 5: just be more vigilant of any strange calls, any texts
Speaker 5: from strangers.
Speaker 2: Yeah, to anybody that wants to video chat with you.
Speaker 4: Do you have any tips and any tips you might
Speaker 4: pass on to folks who in this climate just things
Speaker 4: to listen out for without just being completely paranoid and
Speaker 4: distrustful of everything, you know, I mean yeah, I don't
Speaker 4: know if if if you in the course of your
Speaker 4: reporting kind of learned some things to look for and
Speaker 4: maybe some suggestions you might give to listeners, you know,
Speaker 4: trying to be be vigilant.
Speaker 3: As we're saying, also, Denise, thank you for hopping on
Speaker 3: this video chat with us. Jeez, but that's a that's
Speaker 3: a great question. So we're we're hearing these very scary things.
Speaker 3: We're also learning to exercise empathy for the people who
Speaker 3: got scammed into scamming in your work. As Noel was asking,
Speaker 3: do we arrive at some basic like day one tips
Speaker 3: for the vigilance you describe.
Speaker 5: I am the first to admit that now I am
Speaker 5: so paranoid of any of any text I got my
Speaker 5: way the other day. Just last night, my boyfriend got
Speaker 5: a texted was like, Hey, I'm your neighbor, like can
Speaker 5: you turn down the music? My name is Debbie. And
Speaker 5: we're like, we don't have a neighbor named Debbie. Why
Speaker 5: is this their new way to scam people? Now it
Speaker 5: turns out it was a wrong number, but I was like,
Speaker 5: oh no, oh.
Speaker 3: My gosh, what's going on with Debbie?
Speaker 5: Well, so, you know, like I'm constantly worried about this
Speaker 5: kind of stuff. But I would say, you know, I'll
Speaker 5: give the advice that I give to my mom because
Speaker 5: that is what I often times do. One is I
Speaker 5: would tell her, do not talk to anybody who's tried
Speaker 5: to sneak into your talk to you on Facebook, on WhatsApp,
Speaker 5: like any strangers, Like, just don't talk to them. If
Speaker 5: somebody is reaching out to you that pretends that they're
Speaker 5: from some sort of legitimate company, really try to verify.
Speaker 5: What they will often do is if you look closely
Speaker 5: at the website they give you, check for the legitimate website,
Speaker 5: like google it on your own, just to make sure
Speaker 5: it's the real site. Look at email addresses. Sometimes they'll
Speaker 5: change like one single letter just to make themselves seem
Speaker 5: like they're from the company, but they're really not.
Speaker 4: Make sure that you are L is the real U
Speaker 4: R L exactly?
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, I do RU there you go, they sneak in,
Speaker 5: But yeah, I think that that's That's one thing. And
Speaker 5: then if in doubt, I would also seek out second
Speaker 5: third opinions just to like make sure, so like a
Speaker 5: double verify, Like my momost and me all these texts
Speaker 5: and emails these days and I'll be like, don't respond.
Speaker 5: That's a scam. That's a scam. That's a scam.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: And actually the biggest thing is if you're in conversation
Speaker 5: with any of these people, if anybody asked you to
Speaker 5: set up a crypto account, that is a big red flag.
Speaker 4: You know, don't give my Amazon gift cards another one
Speaker 4: anything like that. That's like untraceable, and yes, yes.
Speaker 5: That's it. Don't don't set up a crypto account to
Speaker 5: do that with strangers.
Speaker 2: Just just while we're here, I want to talk about
Speaker 2: a character named Jella that we meet inside the series,
Speaker 2: and she is somebody who was She was doing the
Speaker 2: hotel reviews scam or you know, one of the one
Speaker 2: of the other scams for a while, but she wasn't
Speaker 2: very good at it because she just couldn't convince people
Speaker 2: to you know, sink all their money into stuff. So
Speaker 2: she got transferred to another office. I don't know if
Speaker 2: it was the same company or a different company, just
Speaker 2: in the same compound, but she was doing a essentially
Speaker 2: a honey pot scam, but just with a whole room
Speaker 2: full of people doing the same scam where they're trying
Speaker 2: to get people to video chat and do lude things
Speaker 2: on video.
Speaker 4: For blackmail extortion.
Speaker 2: It's just incredible to think that there are rooms of
Speaker 2: human beings forced to do that type of work. And
Speaker 2: then we hear stories, especially of younger people, they get
Speaker 2: caught up in something like that. Who you know a
Speaker 2: younger person that thinks they've got oh wow, here is
Speaker 2: potentially a crusher or you know a relationship that I
Speaker 2: could build and it just turns into something that can
Speaker 2: destroy your entire life. You highlight the possibility of self
Speaker 2: harm in some of these situations with another university student
Speaker 2: who gets caught up in one of these things. It's
Speaker 2: just I don't even really have a question here, Denise.
Speaker 2: It's just it's so important for all of us to
Speaker 2: know that this stuff exists to arm our minds against
Speaker 2: it at least a lot little bit.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think to your point about Jella, it's like
Speaker 5: Jella ends up doing a number of different scams and
Speaker 5: without giving everything away, she is reaching out to people
Speaker 5: when she does the sextortion scam, it's she's on dating
Speaker 5: platforms like she's on that kind of problem. Then she
Speaker 5: does she gets moved to another department where they're doing
Speaker 5: pig butchering scams on Amazon's shop like it's just you
Speaker 5: can't avoid it. They are coming everywhere to try and
Speaker 5: develop relationships with people. YIX be careful.
Speaker 3: Yes, as you said earlier, the vigilance is key, and
Speaker 3: we're exploring this sort of stuff together. Obviously. You know,
Speaker 3: the weird thing about the age of ubiquitous social media,
Speaker 3: the fact that anyone around the world can contact anyone else.
Speaker 3: We would have logically assumed it brought people together, but
Speaker 3: it seems to have made people a bit more lonely.
Speaker 3: So we have to ask ourselves about the human drive
Speaker 3: to connect, right and how that human that fundamental human
Speaker 3: drive can be weaponized against people. You know, sometimes we
Speaker 3: end these kind of conversations with the with our little
Speaker 3: takeaway being like call your mom, you know, call your dad,
Speaker 3: check in on the older folks in your life, especially
Speaker 3: people who are not, as we would say, native to
Speaker 3: this world. And one thing that we really want to
Speaker 3: emphasize with your work in Scam Factory is that, as
Speaker 3: you point out, this is a continuing story. This does
Speaker 3: not this does not end with, you know, a nice
Speaker 3: bow wrapped to top the gift. Is there is there
Speaker 3: a way out for people currently experiencing this on either
Speaker 3: side of the phone. We talked about contacting and embassy.
Speaker 3: We talked about a couple of day one kind of
Speaker 3: things we can do to protect our loved ones. Where
Speaker 3: do you see this industry of scam factories going in
Speaker 3: the future. Is there any kind of stop gap?
Speaker 4: Is there?
Speaker 3: Is it accelerating what's going on?
Speaker 5: I hope that there's going to be a stop gap,
Speaker 5: but I hope that there will be change. It's hard
Speaker 5: to It's really hard to predict, right, because these compounds
Speaker 5: are growing so fast. I remember over the course of
Speaker 5: my reporting, I reported on this for about two years.
Speaker 5: Even when I would look at satellite image of Kkparks specifically,
Speaker 5: every month, there'd be new buildings being built, like they're
Speaker 5: just constantly growing and things aren't changing.
Speaker 2: Just the amount of money that goes in there. Right,
Speaker 2: you said twenty five thousand dollars a day quota for
Speaker 2: one office, and we're imagining there's a ton of offices, right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I mean some companies are making The stat
Speaker 5: I had was four hundred thousand dollars a day for
Speaker 5: just one single company. So the amount of money that's
Speaker 5: coming through it could be billions of dollars, and so
Speaker 5: when you think about how much money is going into
Speaker 5: these compounds, you can imagine there's like a lot of
Speaker 5: incentive to like make sure it keeps going. So there's
Speaker 5: a lot of you know, when you're building things at
Speaker 5: this scale, it requires a lot of people to allow
Speaker 5: it to happen. And so there's also that which is
Speaker 5: what makes it sometimes a bit hard to well, not
Speaker 5: a bit, it makes it very hard to stop and
Speaker 5: to hold people accountable.
Speaker 2: Can we talk about how I think Charlie. There's a
Speaker 2: moment where Charlie wants to go see her brother, and
Speaker 2: in order to do that, she negotiates with the character
Speaker 2: we're calling dev in the story. But then she ends
Speaker 2: up meeting people who want to go. They are aware
Speaker 2: that it's a scam factory style thing, they know exactly
Speaker 2: what it is, and they want to go there to
Speaker 2: make money, and they're like, Yeah, that's great, that sounds great,
Speaker 2: I'll go. I guess that blows my mind because it
Speaker 2: does seem like, at least within the story of Scam Factory,
Speaker 2: that there are human beings who are aware of the
Speaker 2: situation in the compounds and still want to go because
Speaker 2: there's a belief that perhaps they can make money for
Speaker 2: a few years and then get out.
Speaker 5: Yeah, there definitely is that. And actually, when I spoke
Speaker 5: to Colonel there are actually people who at trapped there
Speaker 5: but end up staying because they think, you know what,
Speaker 5: at the end of the day, I may not be
Speaker 5: doing something that is above water, is above word, but
Speaker 5: I am making more money than I would make at home.
Speaker 5: So I would rather stay here and at least be
Speaker 5: able to send money back, and I have all the
Speaker 5: amenities I need, which is really crazy that they these
Speaker 5: places become almost a better place to exist in work,
Speaker 5: then they would be back home.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a devil you know, situation sometimes, right, the
Speaker 3: idea that we may we may address or engage with
Speaker 3: with a morally fraud kind of enterprise and in doing
Speaker 3: so perhaps justify for ourselves a greater good. Right, I
Speaker 3: am helping my family, I am pursuing an opportunity and
Speaker 3: always just for a limited time that perhaps is the
Speaker 3: most It's that's yeah, it's.
Speaker 5: Super insidious, and I think that's they weaponize this notion
Speaker 5: of family. They use family to recruit, they use family
Speaker 5: to extort, and they use family to control, Like they're
Speaker 5: using family to do all of the above to keep
Speaker 5: workers doing exactly what they want them to do.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Denise for hanging out with us
Speaker 2: and telling us just about the show you've made. For
Speaker 2: this episode, Wow, this is this is?
Speaker 3: Are you kidding? Thank you for bringing this story further
Speaker 3: into the world, because it's something that is so easy
Speaker 3: to ignore. Right It's common parlance here in the West
Speaker 3: for people to say, oh, you'll never guess what kind
Speaker 3: of scam text I got, and it's very easy to
Speaker 3: forget that they're real people on the other side of
Speaker 3: that line. Scam Factory is available now. Spoilers, folks, It's
Speaker 3: really good. We're not blowing spoke on this one. The reporting,
Speaker 3: Denise you have done got us to I can't speak
Speaker 3: for my palace, Matt and noll At. A couple times
Speaker 3: in the show, I was wondering, Holy shit, is Denise
Speaker 3: going to be okay reporting this? You know what I mean?
Speaker 3: Did you ever feel that you yourself were going to
Speaker 3: get targeted for bringing this to the world. I hope
Speaker 3: the answer is no.
Speaker 5: I mean no, It's in the back of my mind.
Speaker 5: You know. In the early stages there were reporters who
Speaker 5: didn't want to work with me on this because of
Speaker 5: safety concerns, and so that is also one of the
Speaker 5: reasons why we don't use we use pseudonyms on the series,
Speaker 5: because you know, these are people who have escaped from
Speaker 5: criminal syndicates and so they're very afraid, and so that
Speaker 5: is something that we had to take a lot of
Speaker 5: Karen and really making sure that we do what we
Speaker 5: can to protect their identity because it's very very brave
Speaker 5: of them to come share their story. But also on
Speaker 5: top of that, it's taxing, right, this is a traumatic
Speaker 5: experience that they have gone through, and so as a
Speaker 5: reporter or the other thing that is very front of
Speaker 5: mine for me is really making sure that we are
Speaker 5: doing trauma informed reporting and making sure that they are
Speaker 5: they they have, they're in control as they're sharing their
Speaker 5: stories with us. So I would thank my sources for
Speaker 5: speaking and sharing their stories.
Speaker 2: I have a potentially dumb question, what is the syndicate?
Speaker 2: Like we talked about it, but is it multiple criminal organizations?
Speaker 2: Is are there a couple that are just controlling a
Speaker 2: lot of this stuff or they like I'm imagining all
Speaker 2: these different front companies right that are operating in some way.
Speaker 3: Who's the stakeholder cough cough.
Speaker 5: So from my understanding, it's not like there's one family
Speaker 5: crime or criminal organization on the top of everything. It's
Speaker 5: all like the you know, this isn't Batman. So I
Speaker 5: don't know how many how many people are in charge
Speaker 5: at the top. I think there are a lot of entrepreneurs.
Speaker 3: I recall it that entrepreneurs.
Speaker 5: Who see this as an opportunity to make money. And
Speaker 5: I've even heard of like this is really crazy, but
Speaker 5: I've heard of things like a startup kit that have
Speaker 5: been being distributed as to like how you can set
Speaker 5: up your own scamming like scamming company. And so because
Speaker 5: of that, it's it's kind of scary in that you
Speaker 5: can see it as entrepreneurship. And so therefore you can't
Speaker 5: really pinpoint who is at the top of all of this.
Speaker 5: But there has been reporting of of some individuals who've
Speaker 5: been funding some of these things.
Speaker 3: And then yeah, and we can't thank you enough for
Speaker 3: your time bringing this story to the world.
Speaker 4: You have to be so busy.
Speaker 3: And we are are grateful that you're even hanging out
Speaker 3: with us here. We usually, you know, just for the record,
Speaker 3: tell Stoners about Bigfoot. So can I get away with
Speaker 3: that one if we're going to keep it in. So
Speaker 3: this is this, Thanks Andrew. This is something more people
Speaker 3: need to know about, Denise. Is there a place where
Speaker 3: people can learn more about your work, not just with
Speaker 3: this project scam Factory, but with your other endeavors and projects.
Speaker 5: Thank you for asking, Ben. I was just thinking this
Speaker 5: morning that I should really get my website so that
Speaker 5: people can see my work. But yeah, for the time being,
Speaker 5: you can probably you can follow me on social media
Speaker 5: Denise k Chan and on LinkedIn probably the best way
Speaker 5: to see my work, and eventually, hopefully by the time
Speaker 5: this is up, you can find me on my website.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3: Of course, thank you, and there you have it, fellow
Speaker 3: conspiracy realist. We have followed up on our earlier episode
Speaker 3: about KK Park and the troubled order of Meam mark guys. Honestly,
Speaker 3: scam Factory. It's really good, It really really is.
Speaker 4: It's just beautifully researched and reported, obviously, and also the
Speaker 4: sound design is top notch and very immersive without you know,
Speaker 4: kind of getting in the way. Really can't wait to
Speaker 4: hear more. I think there's one more episode to drop
Speaker 4: as we sit and record this today.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and some of us have listened and it
Speaker 2: uh wow, just you should listen. I'll put it that way.
Speaker 2: I don't want to spoil anything. It is such a
Speaker 2: crazy story. And have you said something at the top,
Speaker 2: know all about Charlie, that character Charlie just following the
Speaker 2: journey all the way to the end.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is something that really hit me. You guys,
Speaker 3: Denise Chan and her team are looking at the human
Speaker 3: consequences that we explored briefly, but they're looking at it
Speaker 3: in depth. You know, there's always someone else on the
Speaker 3: other side of the phone, and we know that it
Speaker 3: can be so tempting and easy to clown folks who
Speaker 3: are scammers, but we have to ask where that person
Speaker 3: is coming from and whether they want to be there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's a scam all the way down and
Speaker 2: all the way up, everybody scamming everybody in the chain
Speaker 2: when it comes to this, and guys, it made me
Speaker 2: just think about I don't know, some stuff I kind
Speaker 2: of don't want to say on the mic, just about
Speaker 2: jobs in general, taxes and oh boy, getting scammed. Just heay, No,
Speaker 2: we just need you to work a little bit longer
Speaker 2: you'll retire one day. No, no, no, we promise. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you'll retire. You'll go on that cruise. You'll be sixty,
Speaker 2: maybe eighty, but go on a cruise for sure.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Just keep just keep digging, and pay no attention
Speaker 3: to the gun at the back of your head.
Speaker 2: Y yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and remember you're only renting the shovel anyway, not
Speaker 3: keeping it too dark. We want to hear your thoughts, folks.
Speaker 3: Please check out Scam Factory, and please, please please remember
Speaker 3: that this show only happens with your support. You are
Speaker 3: the most important part of our exploration. As such, we
Speaker 3: would love to hear from you. The rumors are true.
Speaker 3: You can find us on email. You can find us
Speaker 3: on a telephonic device of your choice. You can also
Speaker 3: sip the social means.
Speaker 4: Indeed, you can find us the handle Conspiracy Stuff where
Speaker 4: we exist on Facebook with our Facebook group Here's where
Speaker 4: it gets crazy. On YouTube, we have video content galore
Speaker 4: for you to enjoy, as well as on x FKA, Twitter,
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Speaker 3: We are the entities that read every piece of correspondence
Speaker 3: we received. Be well aware, yet unafree. Sometimes the void
Speaker 3: writes back. Big, big thank you to our many fellow
Speaker 3: listeners who checked in about our run of classic episodes. Guys,
Speaker 3: remember we did some classic episodes for about a week there.
Speaker 2: Yes we did, Indeed we did.
Speaker 5: We did.
Speaker 3: We're back in the saddle. Just to let everybody know
Speaker 3: who asked, we are okay, we are live. We are
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