Global awareness of the increase in industrial-based cyber scam operations in mainland South East Asia, which use trafficked individuals and forced criminality to target the global population with sophisticated scams, continues to grow.

Since 2025, the US, the UK, South Korea, Canada, Australia, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan and the EU have all scaled up efforts to crack down on this activity, conducting threat assessments, introducing sanctions, indicting key perpetrators and building new law enforcement cooperation on the ground in the region. One of the major limits of the emerging response is the tendency to frame the problem as specific to South East Asia. This response fails to recognize the global reach of the syndicates that are powering the industrial-scale compounds in the current epicentre countries of Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. Chinese-origin online gambling and scam syndicates have tapped deeply into resources around the globe in order to consolidate their criminal empires in South East Asia. These criminal actors have now also made significant inroads into a wide range of alternative geographies to advance cyber scam operations on a global scale. Of these, South Asia stands out as a region most significantly affected by trafficking in persons for forced criminality into South East Asia, but it is also an emerging operational hub.

This briefing note is one output of a broader study that assesses the extent of the convergence between Chinese-origin cybercrime groups operating in South East Asia and criminal actors across the South Asia region. Focused on India, Nepal and Sri Lanka, it considers the development of cyber scams and online fraud domestically in each country, as well as the local regulatory frameworks and policy responses in each case. This includes a review of available resources – including court and police records and media reports – to analyze the historical involvement of Chinese-origin criminal actors as cyber scams emerged in these countries. All three countries have followed a somewhat similar trajectory in terms of the development of online scams and fraud, but India stands out as having stronger resilience to these forms of crime while also serving as a major provider of external support to other countries in South Asia.

The research identified and documented several patterns of convergence between South Asian, Chinese and South East Asian crime groups that collectively represent major challenges to national, regional and global security. The first of these patterns is the convergence of transnational criminal organizations operating in China and beyond with crime groups in South Asia. This pattern emerged in the late 2010s, coinciding with the migration of Chinese online gambling syndicates across the region. It has intensified particularly since late 2025, as international pressure on cyber scam operations in South East Asia has increased.

Secondly, there is a convergence between cyber scam operations in South East Asia and South Asia-based recruitment and trafficking networks, as well as criminal organizations in South Asia involved in job scams and visitor visa scams. This poses a major human trafficking threat across South Asia, while simultaneously fuelling a rapid increase in the involvement of South Asians and South Asian diaspora groups in cyber scams.

A third convergence occurs at a regional level, where criminal actors from India, Nepal and Sri Lanka are increasingly exploiting the lack of cross-border connectivity between regional law enforcement, regulatory authorities and financial institutions. This enables them to perpetrate scams across borders. Chinese-origin scam syndicates are involved in this regional trend, but with regional crime groups adapting their methodologies and operating structures into their own distinct cyber scam operations.

The study also documented serious regulatory gaps, especially in Sri Lanka. Since 2023, the country has emerged as a new hub for Chinese online gambling operators – serving as a front for online scam operations – who have relocated from the Philippines, Myanmar and Cambodia. Sri Lanka is at serious risk of becoming a hub for industrial-scale cyber scams, and immediate preventative actions are needed to disrupt the criminal consolidation presently underway in the country. This briefing note succinctly summarizes these findings for a policy audience, considers implications for the United Kingdom, and concludes with a series of recommendations.

Key points

• Current responses to the scam industry tend to focus solely on South East Asia, the current epicentre of the problem. This approach fails to recognize that the criminal networks responsible, particularly Chinese-origin syndicates, have a more global reach – with recent inroads seen in South Asia, including in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka.
• Collaboration between criminal groups operating in China and those in South Asia has grown out of the migration of Chinese online gambling syndicates to the region. However, it has intensified since late 2025, with the increased international pressure on South East Asian operations.
• Cyber scam operations in South East Asia and recruitment and trafficking networks in South Asia are collaborating to bring people into South Asia under the false pretences of job opportunities and visitors visas.
• South Asia criminal actors are increasingly exploiting the lack of regional cooperation between law enforcement and regulatory authorities, enabling them to more easily perpetrate scams across borders.
• There are serious regulatory gaps in the response, particularly in Sri Lanka, which has emerged as a hub for Chinese online gambling operators since 2023, and is at risk of becoming a new hub for large-scale cyber scam operations.