00:00The term pig butchering refers to the time and effort the scammer puts into building
00:04a relationship with their target, like a farmer fattening a pig for slaughter.
00:08These can be romantic relationships – in fact, pig butchering originated on Chinese
00:12dating apps – but often the relationships are platonic, framed as business opportunities.
00:17Victims are eventually persuaded to fork out cash for investments, usually paid in cryptocurrency,
00:22which is easy to launder and hard to trace.
00:24Estimates suggest the crypto scam industry generates more than $500 billion a year – that's
00:30around the same as the global illegal drugs trade.
00:32In Cambodia, the heart of the pig butchering industry, scam operations generate revenue
00:37equivalent to 60% of the country's GDP.
00:40These are huge and organized operations, run like a business and involving hundreds of thousands
00:45of employees.
00:46Many of them work in huge compounds in Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos – some of these were once
00:51casinos linked to the Chinese mafia.
00:53This was a huge source of revenue until Cambodia cracked down on legalized gambling.
00:57That's when many Chinese criminal syndicates pivoted to pig butchering.
01:01The scammers themselves are often victims of scams, having travelled to these fraud factories
01:05under the promise of legitimate work opportunities.
01:08Former employees report slavery-like conditions, with workers made to work long hours, threatened
01:13with violence and imprisoned on the compound, which is patrolled by armed guards.
01:17The crisis of the virus is now on the disruptions.
01:17carrying a b城ic fund.
01:17We are currently in the first lockdown, in the past.
01:17I don't know that this area to be able to make sure it's ready for the
01:17In the second lockdown, we have to work with our weapons.
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