How scam centres drive global fraud

Fraud now works on an international, industrial scale, enabled by AI, low-cost digital tools and increased global criminal collaboration.

INTERPOL’s 2026 Global Financial Fraud Threat Assessment describes fraud as one of the world’s most severe and rapidly evolving transnational crimes, now at the centre of polycriminality, intersecting with organised crime, human trafficking and cybercrime. In the UK alone, this led to over £1.1 billion being stolen in 2024 across a record 3.3 million reported incidents.

An increasing amount of this fraud now originates in scam centres. These are vast criminal compounds that have spread across Southeast Asia and beyond, where trafficked workers are forced to run fraudulent operations around the clock.

The proceeds arrive as client funds, transaction payments and property purchases. The challenge for any regulated professional is that the fraud may be several steps removed from the transaction in front of you. Understanding where the money comes from makes it easier to spot when you come into contact with it.

The rise of scam centres

Increasingly, fraud operations are not run by individuals working alone. They’re run by organised criminal networks operating at an international scale. Many of them trace back to the same physical infrastructure: scam compounds that have spread across Southeast Asia. 

Workers are lured with convincing job offers, transported across borders and forced to run fraud schemes under threat of violence. A UN report from 2025 found that victims from at least 66 countries had been trafficked into scam centres, with over 300,000 people estimated to be working in operations across Southeast Asia. 

Victims, who have been interviewed for organisations like the UN, describe receiving or witnessing severe mistreatment amounting to torture when targets aren’t met. Low-performing teams can be publicly subjected to abuse as a warning to others. This includes rape and forced prostitution. Unsurprisingly, deaths inside compounds are frequently mentioned by survivors.

Many international investment and employment scams, as well as romance fraud, originate from these compounds. UNODC estimates these operations now generate just under $40 billion in annual profits. As a result, FATF has committed to making the rise of scam centres and the proliferation of these compounds a specific focus of its work over the coming years. 

The fraud these centres specialise in

Investment fraud

Someone is approached, online, by phone or through a contact, and persuaded to put money into what looks like a legitimate investment. It might be cryptocurrency, foreign exchange, commodities or a trading platform. 

The funds are actually never invested. They go straight to the fraudsters, who now need to clean them. Investment fraud is one of the primary revenue streams for scam centres globally, with workers in compounds running dozens of fake platforms simultaneously from the same desk.

Romance fraud

Romance fraud and investment fraud are now frequently combined. Scam centre workers begin a relationship online, building the other person’s trust over weeks or months. Then they introduce a financial element. This might be an emergency, an investment opportunity or a simple request for help. 

The victim transfers money willingly, believing they’re helping someone they know. FATF documents romance fraud proceeds moving through mule accounts, withdrawn as cash or transferred via trade-based laundering across borders. The victim often doesn’t report it, which means the proceeds move without anyone looking.

Business email compromise

Scam networks have been found to share scripts, techniques and technology across borders, suggesting that business email compromise is now industrialised in the same way as other fraud types. 

It works by sending a business an email that looks like it’s from a supplier, a senior colleague or a client, but with the account details changed. The payment goes to a fraudster’s account instead. These frauds often involve large single payments, which is what makes the proceeds so urgent to move.

In one case documented by FATF, an accountant at a Chinese company was added to a group messaging app under the pretence of an annual account inspection and directed to transfer funds, which were then laundered through virtual asset service providers.

Payment diversion fraud

This method is similar to business email compromise but often targets individuals rather than businesses. It might be a conveyancing transaction, a supplier invoice or a salary payment, where the account details are intercepted or faked. 

For legal professionals and accountants handling client payments, this is one of the most direct ways fraud proceeds can appear in your work.

Employment scams

As well as being the primary recruitment method for scam centre workforces, this type of fraud is also used to create unwitting money mules, one of the most common ways to launder cyber-enabled fraud proceeds.

The victim is offered a job that doesn’t exist or a job that isn’t what it appears to be. They’re asked to receive payments into their account and transfer them on, with the explanation that it’s a legitimate business function.

The role of money mules and shell companies

The types of fraud described above all generate proceeds that need to move quickly. The first step is usually through money mules. These are individuals whose bank accounts are used to receive and pass on funds. Some are recruited knowingly. Many are not. 

Mules are often found through the same methods scam centres use to find victims. A fake job offer, a romantic relationship, an investment opportunity. The person agrees to receive payments and transfer them on, believing there’s a legitimate explanation. 

FATF identifies money mules as one of the two most common mechanisms used to launder cyber-enabled fraud proceeds. The other is shell companies.

Shell companies add a layer of legitimacy while also obscuring the link between the fraudsters and the funds. Proceeds move into a corporate vehicle, often with an opaque ownership structure, where they can be mixed with other funds or invoiced against fake transactions.

Ultimately, payments can pass through three or four accounts across different jurisdictions within hours. Each transfer makes it harder to follow and easier to present as legitimate by the time it reaches a professional services transaction.

From scam centre to your business

By the time fraud proceeds reach a regulated professional, they rarely look like fraud. The money has already moved through several pairs of hands. What you see simply looks like a new client, company formation or property purchase.

But there are signs. Fraud might show up as:

• income that doesn’t align with a client’s stated business activity;
• funds moving through a company with no clear commercial rationale;
• a transaction funded from a source that can’t be readily explained;
• a client account used to receive and pass on payments;
• a company formation where the beneficial ownership isn’t clear;
• a property purchase funded by a party with no obvious connection to the buyer.

While the fraud may be several steps removed from what you’re looking at, that doesn’t reduce your obligations.

What are your obligations?

FATF Recommendation 3 requires all member jurisdictions to criminalise the laundering of fraud proceeds. This means the obligation to act on suspicion exists whether you’re based in the UK, Australia, the UAE or anywhere else operating under FATF-aligned legislation.

If you know or suspect that funds connected to a client or transaction are linked to criminal conduct, you have an obligation to report the suspicious activity or transaction. The threshold is suspicion, not proof. You don’t need to establish that fraud has occurred. Instead, your obligation is to recognise when something doesn’t add up and escalate accordingly.

The amount involved doesn’t change your obligation either. Fraud proceeds move in small amounts as well as large ones. A mule account handling a few hundred dollars and a corporate structure concealing millions are part of the same money laundering ecosystem.

In the UK, only an estimated 14% of fraud against individuals is ever reported to police. The volume moving through the financial system and professional services businesses is likely to be far higher than the reported figures suggest.