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The scam-compound industry, mapped end to end.
For police, prosecutors, financial-intelligence units, regulators and investigators: recruitment pipeline, compound map, money trail, the scripts victims hear, and detection signals, from the insider who leaked a compound’s playbook to WIRED.
Open the full-screen briefing. Use the arrow keys to move between slides.
1. Live map: compounds and active routes
Reported hubs by status. The red animated line is an active route reported in November 2026 (Bangkok → Mae Sot → Myawaddy); the amber line is a recruitment route documented by WIRED (Bangkok → Chiang Mai → Golden Triangle SEZ).
Full compound map with sources → Example profile: KK Park
2. The recruitment pipeline
Lure
Fake jobs: customer support, “IT manager”, data entry, translation. High pay, typing-test interviews, offers via Telegram, Facebook, LinkedIn and friend-of-a-friend contacts.
Transit
Flight to a regional hub such as Bangkok, then road travel to a border town. In the Myawaddy corridor the route runs via Mae Sot. Tourist visas, tickets “repaid from salary”.
Crossing
Handlers meet recruits at the border and move them across, often through informal crossings, before documents are taken.
Control
Passports taken, debt and fines, quotas, phones collected on shift. Buyout prices set to keep workers inside.
Operation
Scripted pig-butchering, task and impersonation scams run against victims overseas, timed to their daytime.
Displacement
After raids: smaller, mobile sites on generators and satellite internet; moves inland and to new countries.
Victims documented around Myanmar’s borders include Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Nepalese and Kenyan nationals, with growing numbers from Ethiopia and Uganda (Centre for Information Resilience, 2026).
3. The money trail
Large first-time transfers, often by older customers, “for an investment a friend recommended”.
Victim told to open an account on a mainstream exchange and buy USDT.
Funds sent to a wallet controlled by the operation; the app shows fake profits.
Withdrawals blocked until the victim pays more: tax, unlock fees, VIP upgrades, fake asset-freeze letters.
Mule accounts, OTC desks, casinos and payment companies; crypto moved through networks tied to sanctioned groups.
Victims re-targeted by fake “recovery” agents, lawyers or officials who charge upfront fees.
TRM Labs found about US$1.07bn in crypto reached 34 Sihanoukville casinos between January and September 2026, about 64% to casinos tied to OFAC-sanctioned networks, including more than US$320m received after designation. Source
4. What the victim hears: the scripts
Annotated excerpts from the compound’s own training documents. Each one marks a point where a bank, platform or officer can interrupt the scam.
First, they decide if you are worth robbing.
A leaked scam-compound training script shows how workers judge your wealth from your job, age and family in the first days of chatting. Learn the sign…
Exhibit 02 · The mentorThe “aunt” is planted early, the money comes later.
A leaked scam script tells workers to mention an aunt or uncle as a life mentor weeks before revealing that this relative “taught them to invest”.…
Exhibit 03 · The productA product with “no chance of loss”.
Read the leaked scam-compound script used to sell “AI arbitrage” crypto trading with guaranteed daily returns, and how to spot the fake product.…
Exhibit 04 · The bankWhen your bank tries to save you, they turn you against it.
Scam compounds train workers for the moment your bank stops a transfer. Read the leaked script that makes victims distrust their bank, and what to do.…
Exhibit 05 · The warningThey even script the FBI call.
A leaked scam script has the “friend” describe an FBI anti-fraud call and say they were not angry, preparing victims to ignore real warnings.…
Exhibit 06 · The cameraA ready-made list of excuses to never meet you.
Scam compounds give workers numbered excuses to avoid video calls and meetings. Read the leaked list and learn why “no call” means no trust.…
Exhibit 07 · The secretSecrecy is sold as love.
A leaked scam-compound script asks victims to keep an investment secret “because you are important in my heart”. Here is why secrecy protects the scam…
Exhibit 08 · The flatteryCopy-paste love letters.
The emotional messages in romance scams are stored in shared documents and pasted to many targets. Read examples from a leaked compound file.…
Exhibit 09 · The timelineHow a stranger becomes an investor in a week.
A leaked Chinese-language training file, 七天速战法, lays out a day-by-day plan for turning a stranger into a scam investor. Read the timeline.…
Top WhatsApp scams, ranked from the leak →
5. Detection signals
Banks & fintech
- Customer moving savings to an exchange after meeting someone online
- Customer angry at a hold, repeating lines that sound coached (the leaked scripts prepare victims to argue with their bank)
- Repeated payments described as “tax” or “release fee”
- Mentions of “AI arbitrage”, mining machines or an uncle/aunt mentor
Platforms & telecom
- “Wrong number” openers followed by moves to WhatsApp/Telegram
- Accounts posting daily-life personas with stock photos
- Recruitment posts for overseas customer-support or typing jobs with free flights
- Bulk SIMs and satellite terminals near border zones
Immigration & police
- Young travellers on tourist visas with job offers in border zones
- Tickets paid by a third party, onward road travel from the arrival city
- Families reporting relatives who “went for an IT job” and lost contact
- Returnees: treat as possible trafficking victims first (non-punishment principle)
6. Sanctions timeline
| Date | Authority | Action |
|---|---|---|
| Dec 2023 | UK | Karen Border Guard Force leader, over Shwe Kokko. |
| 5 May 2025 | US OFAC | Karen National Army (KNA), formerly the Karen BGF. |
| 8 Sep 2025 | US OFAC | Shwe Kokko and Cambodia-based scam-centre targets. |
| 14 Oct 2025 | US & UK | Prince Group network (146 targets); the UK also designated Jin Bei and Golden Fortune. |
| 12 Nov 2025 | US OFAC | DKBA and the companies OFAC says developed Tai Chang, KK Park and Huanya. US Scam Center Strike Force announced. |
| 23 Apr 2026 | US OFAC | Kok An network (29 targets). |
| 23 Jun 2026 | US OFAC | Further Prince Group designations. |
| 5 Nov 2026 | US OFAC | Further Prince Group designations and a Madagascar-based scam network. |
Sources
Field report · 2026-11 · Unverified
Bangkok → Myawaddy movement reported to be continuing
A source in contact with Redbull reports that people are still being moved from Bangkok to Myawaddy, and that compounds operating in Myawaddy use Starlink satellite internet. This has not been independently verified.
Public reporting supports the pattern: SpaceX said it disabled more than 2,500 Starlink terminals near Myanmar scam compounds in October 2025, and investigators in 2026 describe newer, smaller sites running on generators and satellite internet.
7. Working with Redbull
Unit and task-force briefings
How compounds recruit, control, script and launder, backed by the primary documents.
Case support
Reading chat logs and scripts, identifying stages and roles, explaining compound vocabulary.
Secure channel
Signal Redbull1.54 · [email protected]. Sensitive material is discussed with vetted agencies only, never published.
Victims first
No personal data of victims or trafficked workers is published. Workers forced into scams should be treated as possible trafficking victims.
Police, prosecutors, FIUs, regulators and NGOs.
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