Over the past two decades, Cambodia has become a central node in the global online scam economy. Initially embedded in casino developments along national borders, this industry has spread widely and is now deeply rooted in numerous communities, reshaping land use, labour markets, mobility patterns and environmental conditions across the country. It has become a major force in local development, particularly in border towns, rural districts, indigenous territories and coastal concession zones.

While the response to Cambodian scam centres to date has been multifaceted, so far it has failed to tackle the underlying drivers and enablers of this criminal industry. Government crackdowns launched in 2025 curtailed some operations and led to the deportation or departure of tens of thousands of scam workers, but evidence from the field indicates that the territorial networks remain largely intact. In fact, in many areas, scam-related construction continues, recruitment persists and operations are resuming in more dispersed or less visible forms.

In many communities, this illegal industry is changing how local economies function and how towns and cities grow, so that they increasingly support a transnational criminal system. This shift has redirected economic activities away from traditional agrarian and commercial practices and embedded local territories within illicit global networks. Despite this, for many households, the industry has become a normalized, albeit precarious, source of employment, given the limited opportunities in agriculture, manufacturing and other legally registered businesses and services.

The resulting social and spatial disruptions are considerable. Residents face more fragmented communities, weakened social cohesion, new forms of land dispossession and the erosion of long-standing relationships to land and livelihoods. These changes have also contributed to environmental degradation. While such processes have long been observed in urban settings and government-granted land areas, their spread into rural villages can exert a particularly destabilizing impact.

Drawing on field research across eight locations in seven provinces, this policy brief provides insights into the wide and diverse effects of the scam industry on communities and economies across Cambodia, and discusses implications for response. It shows that framing scams solely as a criminal or cybersecurity issue rather than as a development, labour, land governance and social protection problem not only fails to address the political and economic conditions that allow scam economies to embed themselves, but also risks further entrenching the criminal ecosystem as more and more people are drawn into it.

Key points

• The expansion of the online scam industry is closely connected to broader economic processes, including foreign investment in development projects, the rise of casino-based economies and the implementation of policies promoting economic corridors.
• In Cambodia, this expansion reflects a spatial shift of the industry towards secondary cities, villages and remote areas, which has profound consequences for the communities whose socio-economic conditions are already undergoing rapid deterioration.
• There is an urgent need to develop a research and intervention agenda focused on the local effects of the online scam industry that adopts a cross-cutting analysis of the social, economic, environmental and governance implications of this illegal economy.
• Substantial efforts in outreach and support are needed for residents of secondary cities and rural areas who are directly affected by this industry, as current awareness initiatives primarily focus on preventing workers from entering scam operations.
• Including the perspectives of local communities, victims and people living close to compounds or linked and drawn to the illicit economy through work is crucial to capturing its consequences beyond the confines of scam compounds and beyond victims of human trafficking.
• Understanding the local impact of this industry will enable the design of better risk mitigation policies that could prevent the entrenchment and enlargement of illegal economic activities while reinforcing the accountability of local territorial authorities.