(NationRise.com) – Interpol has reported a sharp increase in the number of cyber-fraud cases related to human trafficking. In the latest scams, criminal networks post lucrative jobs and freelancing projects online. Enticed victims respond to the ads and are invited for interviews. Then, they are kidnapped and forced to work in various online fraud schemes.
The victims are often transferred to other countries and given fake identities to defraud banks. Some are also forced to work in call centers where they are required to act as telemarketers in gathering sensitive information from unsuspecting victims.
Most of these new cases are popping up in Southern Asia. However, Latin American countries are also seeing an increase. Interpol reports that operations are springing up in several other countries as well. Scammers often use torture to force laborers to work.
Interpol said that global coordination is required to properly fight back against human trafficking scams. Bad players often use the Internet to coordinate their efforts globally. There was recently an incident during which victims from Uganda were transported to Dubai, Thailand, and Myanmar to defraud various banks. They are also able to monitor the actions of law enforcement more easily.
However, those agencies are also better able to monitor the actions, movement, and communications of possible fraudsters. Authorities in Myanmar have already rescued several victims who originated from a total of 22 different countries, mainly in Asia and Africa.
Human traffickers have also become more bold in recent years, with Mexican cartels at the US border proudly sharing pictures of their victims online. The US and other governments have faced intense scrutiny for their seeming inaction on the issue.
Record numbers of illegal crossings have occurred under the Biden Administration’s watch, and those surges typically increase the cases of human trafficking. The increase of human trafficking scams in Latin America has led to concerns of the problem spreading into the United States. There has been a notable increase in the number of unaccompanied minors in the region.
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