Scam compounds uncovered in Timor-Leste

Police in Timor-Leste say they have uncovered a major international scam operation, arresting hundreds of mainly Chinese and Indonesian nationals in raids across the capital, Dili.

Timor-Leste police raided three heavily secured call centre compounds over the past five days, arresting 253 workers in a highly visible crackdown against what experts say is a growing trade in the developing nation.

A separate raid was conducted in late June, bringing the total number of people arrested over the past three weeks to 314.

Some of the accused scammers were paraded one by one in court in Dili on Monday and Tuesday, accused of money laundering, criminal association and illegal online gaming.

Police say the accused were using the centres to scam "overseas targets", but have not yet revealed the methodology of the scam or whether Australian residents have been targeted specifically in the operations.

Scam centre compounds in South-East Asian countries, such as Cambodia, have used scripts impersonating police officers in calls to Australians, in what authorities have described as well-organised criminal enterprises.

Although many accuse the Cambodian government of being complicit in their operation, these centres have been progressively targeted by authorities, meaning scammers are now looking to new areas in the region to set up shop.

After multiple warnings from transnational crime experts, Timor-Leste's capital, just 700 kilometres north of Darwin, has now emerged as a new scam centre hub.

Experts, such as University of Adelaide adjunct professor Michael Rose, said organised crime groups looked for developing nations susceptible to corruption and weak cyber-security laws to set up shop.

"They [scammers] target places which are perceived to have weak governance, and police forces which might lack the technical capacity," Dr Rose, who has visited scam centres in Timor-Leste, told the ABC.

"Those factors, you'd think, might make Timor-Leste vulnerable to this sort of operation.

"But what the criminal networks are finding is that the place is no pushover. I suspect that [the raids] may have come as a sort of a surprise to some of these networks."

Passports held

Local police say some of the centres raided were large residential homes or offices being inadvertently rented out by locals to the criminal enterprises and converted into heavily secured and fortified premises.

One local who rented out one of the homes told local media he was told the Chinese workers were in Dili to work on building a new convention centre in the capital.

"It was only when police contacted me and called me to the house that I learned they were carrying out other activities there,"

he said.

Police say they uncovered laptops and thousands of SIM cards in the raids. Multiple Starlink units were also uncovered — a critical element for the scammers to operate in the country, which has one of the slowest average internet speeds in the world.

Police say the majority of the workers charged entered on tourist visas.

The passports of those accused were also confiscated. However, the ABC understands more than 50 of the workers had no passports, meaning they were likely confiscated by their employers.

Police have indicated they have other leads and have other targets for raids over the coming weeks.

In a statement, Timor-Leste's government said it had "no tolerance" for transnational criminal activities in the country.

A growing threat

Concerns about transnational crime have been growing in Timor-Leste since last year when police carried out a raid at a hotel in the Oécusse region, where they detained more than 30 foreign nationals, seizing computers, SIM cards and Starlink equipment.

Dr Rose, who visited the scam centre involved after it was raided, said workers there were targeting a number of different countries.

"There were calls going out to Brazil from Timorese who speak a bit of Portuguese; they found young people [and] got them to sort of make these phone calls," he said.

"There were scam calls going out to Malaysia and Indonesia, once again, employing Bahasa-speaking Timorese as well as Indonesians [and] some in English."

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) last year issued an alert about the emergence of triad-linked scam centres in the country.

They warned that as criminal organisations increasingly came under pressure in South-East Asia, they had begun moving into countries with "limited experience with scam centre operations" and weaker cybercrime regulations.

UNODC estimated that hundreds of scam centres across the region, particularly in Cambodia, Myanmar, and Laos, generated more than $50 billion in annual profits.

A senior member of Timor-Leste's government has also raised concerns.

Last year Ágio Pereira, the Minister of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, posted an explosive manifesto on Facebook alleging that Timorese regulatory bodies were being bought by organised crime.

He also warned that Timor-Leste risked becoming "an amusement park for transnational crime syndicates".

Earlier this year, a Guardian and OCCRP investigation found an alleged connection between the Cambodia-based Prince Group and individuals involved in the plans for a luxury resort to be built in Timor-Leste.

The Guardian report described the Prince Group as "a multi-billion-dollar transnational network accused of money laundering and fraud through elaborate scams reliant on human trafficking, slavery and violence".

In response to the Guardian article, Timor-Leste's President José Ramos-Horta denied that criminal networks had a foothold in the country.

"We remain vulnerable to threats and infiltration by foreign organised crime," he said.

"The incident that occurred in Oécusse a few months ago was met with swift government intervention to shut it down. The government has also closed illegal gaming operations in Dili.

"Currently, I do not see any organised crime installed in Timor-Leste."