奋斗

China crackdown on cyber scams nets thousands but leaves networks intact_我的网站

一 |     BANGKOK -- Zhang Hongliang, a former restaurant manager in central China, took various gigs in and outside China to support his family after losing his job during the COVID-19 pandemic.In March, a job offer to teach Chinese cooking at a restaurant led him into a cyber scam compound in Myanmar, where he was instead ordered to lure Chinese into giving up their savings for fake investment schemes via social media platforms.Zhang is one of tens of thousands of people, mostly but not all Chinese, who have become ensnared in cyber scam networks run by powerful Chinese criminal syndicates in Southeast Asia. Regional and Chinese authorities have netted thousands of people in a crackdown, but experts say they are failing to root out the local elites and criminal networks that are bound to keep running the schemes.When scam operations are shut down in one place they often just resurface elsewhere. The problem is an embarrassment for Beijing and is discouraging ordinary Chinese from traveling to Southeast Asia out of fear they might be duped or kidnapped and caught up in a cyber scam operation. In recent years, media reports have uncovered instances of young people being lured to places in Cambodia or Myanmar for high-paying jobs, only to be forced to work as scammers. Rescue organizations say people are regularly beaten or face physical punishments such as being forced to run laps if they don't perform well. In August, China, Thailand, Laos and Myanmar agreed to set up a joint police operations center to tackle cyber scams in the region. On Oct. 10, China’s Ministry of Public Security announced that its “Summer Operation” had successfully brought back 2,317 scam suspects from northern Myanmar to China.China calls such people suspects, though experts say most of them are victims who were forced to work for the criminals. They question how they will be treated once back in China. The schemes based in countries like Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia are run by Chinese bosses hand-in-hand with local elites. Many are based in places where China has financed big construction projects through leader Xi Jinping’s signature Belt and Road Initiative.Myanmar's border regions long have been a magnet for criminals — historically including drug producers and traffickers — because of lax law enforcement. Such places are generally under the control of ethnic minority armed groups, either opposed to or allied with Myanmar’s central government. Some also cooperate with organized crime gangs.“From the vantage point of the Chinese government, it’s a source of extreme embarrassment that you have so many of these Chinese criminals operating all across Southeast Asia,” said Jason Tower, an expert on transnational crime with the United States Institute of Peace.The syndicates also are known for “pig butchering” cons, where scammers entice individuals, often halfway across the world, to invest their money in bogus schemes after duping them into digital romances.The scammers divide their targets into two categories: Chinese and non-Chinese. They use scripts, images of models and influencers and translation software to trick the people they contact by phone or online into parting with their money. Victims can be anywhere in the world.The criminals have “ridden on the shoulders of the Belt and Road Initiative,” said Tower, who outlined links between the criminals and Chinese state enterprises, think tanks and government officials in a 2020 report written for the United States Institute of Peace.Zhang was working in Thailand and on a visa run to Laos when he met the man who lured him to the scam compound in Myanmar. Giving what he said was his last name, Gao, he claimed to be a broker and travel agent for Chinese living in Thailand. Zhang and his wife wanted extra money to pay for in vitro fertilization to have another child. Gao suggested he go work in Myawaddy, in eastern Myanmar’s Kayin state, teaching a local chef how to cook Chinese dishes in Gao’s new restaurant. The pay would be double what Zhang made in China.Zhang was wary. Since a 2021 coup, military-controlled Myanmar has been embroiled in civil conflict. But Gao reassured him that he wouldn’t be doing anything illegal and said the restaurant would have plenty of customers since many cyber scam businesses were operating in the area.That might have raised a red flag but it was only once he got to Myanmar that Zhang realized his predicament. He asked to go back home, saying there was a family emergency. His family helped him scrape together some 40,000 yuan ($5,472) to pay off the debt Gao claimed he owed him, and he slipped away one night, swimming across the Moei River into Thailand, where he turned himself in to Thai police, who contacted the Chinese Embassy.Zhang showed the AP copies of his deportation notice from the Thai Immigration police and a temporary ID card. He returned to China in late June and was questioned by Chinese police but not detained. He has been sharing his story on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, to alert others to the risks and says people often contact him about relatives trapped in cyber scam compounds.“We all went out with this wonderful sense of hope, but then reality slammed us in the face,” he said.In total, China has detained some 4,000 suspects and returned them back to China. The Ministry of Public Security has claimed “breakthrough results” through operations in coordination with Myanmar authorities. On Monday, they announced they had repatriated another 2,349 people. The ministry did not respond to a faxed request for comment.One 31-year old former chef who was smuggled into Myanmar’s Wa State earlier this year said he saw his company hand over four people to Chinese police with little fanfare in September. Other companies did the same, said the man, who was smuggled into Myanmar and later rescued by a non-profit organization. He declined to be named out of fear of government retribution, and The Associated Press could not independently verify his account.Overall, the enforcement actions don’t seem very comprehensive, experts say. The groups now based in Myanmar originally were located in Cambodia. When Cambodia cracked down on online gambling rings and illegal casinos in 2019, many of the groups just moved to less well policed places in Myanmar. Some were taken over by rival gangs.China's efforts to repair its image have so far not made much headway, said Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a professor of political science at Thailand’s Chulalongkorn University. “You can crack down on these symptoms and the manifestations … that you can see in the borderland areas," he said, "but they’ll come back unless you really have a sustained effort." -—-AP researcher Wanqing Chen in Beijing and AP writers Grant Peck and Jintamas Saksornchai in Bangkok contributed to this report.。    　　讯 8月18日上午，国家数据局举行2026上合组织数字经济论坛新闻发布会。新疆维吾尔自治区党委常委、自治区常务副主席张迎春在会上表示，近年来，新疆深入贯彻落实党中央、国务院关于数字中国建设的决策部署，立足区位优势和资源禀赋，将数字经济融入经济社会发展全局，持续深耕数字经济领域，推动数字产业提质增效，数字经济核心产业增加值占GDP比重逐年提升，逐步形成了特色鲜明、优势突出、开放多元的数字经济发展新格局。　　张迎春介绍，新疆作为丝绸之路经济带核心区，是国家明确的亚欧黄金通道和向西开放桥头堡、新发展格局的战略支点。新疆与上合组织多个成员国地缘相近、人文相通、经贸往来密切，依托区位优势、资源条件、历史积淀，新疆形成了服务上合组织数字合作的三个方面独特优势。

二 | 　　一是战略区位得天独厚，开放发展势能强劲。

三 | 新疆拥有“五口通八国、一路连欧亚”的独特区位优势，是中国向西开放的重要窗口。近年来，全疆经济社会高质量发展态势持续向好，2025年，地区生产总值达2.15万亿元，同比增长5.5%，增速高于全国平均水平0.5个百分点，居全国第5位；货物进出口总额达5200亿元，同比增长19.9%，增速高于全国16.1个百分点，居全国第1位，经济运行稳中有进、进中提质。经济社会的高质量发展为数字经济对外开放、跨境合作提供了坚实的合作基础，也为承接上合组织多边数字合作搭建了优质战略平台。　　二是开放通道体系完善，跨境联通高效畅通。新疆目前拥有14类56个国家级重点开放平台、19个对外开放口岸，口岸通关、跨境物流、贸易通道体系日趋成熟。已与228个国家和地区建立常态化贸易往来，已建设3个区域性国际通信出入口局，开通中亚方向28条跨境国际光缆，国家相关部委正在支持新疆建设国家互联网骨干直连点，持续夯实与上合组织成员国贸易互通、数字互联基础，中国（新疆）自由贸易试验区制度创新效应持续释放，为跨境数字贸易、数字技术合作、数据跨境流通打通了双向通道。

四 | 　　三是数字产业根基扎实，转型动能持续迸发。

五 | 持续推动能源、特色农业等传统优势产业数字化、智能化、绿色化转型，不断培育数字经济新赛道、新增长点。聚焦绿色算力、跨境数字贸易、智慧能源、数字文旅、智慧农业等重点领域，持续推进数字产业化、产业数字化双向赋能、协同发展。特别是新疆风、光资源无限，且与中部、东部约两小时的自然时差形成了能源时空优势互补，新能源装机总规模截止到7月底突破1.74亿千瓦，已建成6个千万千瓦级新能源基地，丰富的清洁能源资源优势将为与上合国家开展数字基建共建、数字产业协同、技术成果共享奠定坚实产业基础。　　张迎春表示，下一步，将持续深化与上合组织成员国在数字经济领域务实合作，全力推动数字基础设施联通、数字产业发展协同、数字人才交流互通，为服务国家向西开放战略、共建数字丝绸之路贡献新疆力量。版权申明：凡注有“”或电头为“”的稿件，均为独家版权所有，未经许可不得转载或镜像；授权转载必须注明来源为“”，并保留“”的电头。    。

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