【Dialogue】The Chinese Academy of Sciences doctor reveals the details of the Myanmar campus fraud: the fraud model is widely known, and the performance has been declining

Interface News Reporter | Zhang Xu

Interface News Editor | Zhai Ruimin

Recently, Mr. Zhang, a doctor of the Chinese Academy of Sciences who was deceived into Myanmar for a year, has been rescued and returned to China. On the evening of September 11, 2023, Mr. Zhang posted on the Weibo platform that he had returned to China on September 5, and due to cooperation with the investigation and physical discomfort, he did not post a post to inform the public, and he will explain the issues of concern to everyone in the future.

On September 12, Mr. Zhang posted again that Myawaddy was located in the southeast region of Myanmar, just across a small river from Thailand, and far from northern Myanmar, which was rumored on the Internet. Because it does not border China, it is extremely difficult for the Chinese side to enter the area, and the fraud patterns and targets here are very different from those in northern Myanmar. Because Myanmar scams are so famous, parks often use jobs in Thailand as bait when recruiting and avoid talking about Myanmar.

On September 15, Interface News contacted Mr. Zhang. He said his mental state has now returned to normal. At the same time, he also provided Interface News with two internal training materials of the scam company, one is more than 10,000 words of bilingual Chinese and English "Learning Business Professional Knowledge", and the other is "Chat Example" composed of screenshots of scam chats. For this experience, he hopes to be able to tell it and alert more people.

The following is the conversation between Interface News and Mr. Zhang:

Fall into a "trap": the soldier shoots when he finds himself fleeing

Interface News: Why do you want to go abroad to find a job?

Mr. Zhang: In 2022, due to family illness and personal external debt, I want to change to a job with decent treatment. At that time, due to the impact of the domestic epidemic, many companies did not have employment needs. I remember posting 10-20 resumes and never getting a response. This led to the idea that I wanted to seek work opportunities abroad.

Initially, I learned online through an intermediary that I had the opportunity to work as a translator and English customer service in Singapore. Before going abroad, I repeatedly communicated with the agent and verified for several months, and the relevant procedures and procedures seemed to be more formal, making sure that there were no major problems before deciding to go abroad.

Interface News: When did you realize you were being scammed?

Mr. Zhang: I was brought into a fraud park in Myawaddy only to find out that I had been deceived. My previous job search was in Singapore, but due to the pandemic, the entry process in Singapore was complicated and my visa was not available. At this time, the agent said that the company also has a branch in Thailand, and suggested that I can work in Thailand for a period of time and then transfer to Singapore after the visa is issued. I didn't suspect that this was the first step in the scam.

On August 15, 2022, I arrived in Mae Sot, Thailand, unaware that I had been scammed. At that time, there was a special person to arrange pick-up and drop-off, and accommodation was also provided. In addition, someone took the initiative to introduce me to the company, so that I could further dispel my doubts. I was thinking about making some money first, at least scraping together the money for the trip to Singapore and then thinking about anything else. I was then taken to the park and they took my phone and documents. They gave me the reason that it involved a non-disclosure agreement, and they would give me a new phone. But by then, I couldn't communicate with the outside world. A few days after I entered the park, they provided me with a separate dormitory so I couldn't get to know anyone else. After staying with other colleagues, I learned that this was a scam park in Myawaddy, Myanmar.

Interface News: What is the internal environment of the park? Ever thought about running away?

Mr. Zhang: The area of the park is very large, equivalent to a closed university campus, which has office areas, residential areas, commercial areas, gymnasiums, etc., but it is not self-sufficient. Prices in supermarkets and restaurants are 4-5 times higher than outside, and the supply of items inside is not very sufficient, and some things cannot be bought. You can only communicate with your superiors when you have a special need to see if you can solve them.

After entering the park, I initially wanted to escape, and I also heard from colleagues that there was a Chinese of successful escape. However, after a period of observation, I found it extremely difficult to escape in the park. The walls are four or five meters high, and there is also high-voltage electricity on them. Moreover, every few hundred meters there will be a lookout with soldiers standing guard with guns. The soldiers mainly monitor the movement of the park and will shoot if they detect someone fleeing. Moreover, when I first entered the park, I had no money on me, and even if I escaped, I couldn't afford the travel expenses back to China, and I gradually gave up the idea of escaping.

Interface News: In the park, what is your main job and how long do you work? Have you ever completed a task?

Mr. Zhang: The place of work is in a large office, where two or three hundred people work. My job is to use some foreign social software and chat with scammers. The deceived groups are generally middle-aged and elderly people in Europe and the United States with a certain economic foundation, including whites and some overseas Chinese, generally over 40 years old. For whites, you need to chat with them in English with the help of translation software.

The park is based on European and American schedules. Because the scams in Myawaddy in eastern Myanmar are mainly aimed at overseas groups, we have to "work" from 10 p.m. the day before to 3 p.m. the next day. If the individual fails to complete the task that day or the company's performance is not good, they will work extra overtime, working at least 16 or 17 hours a day.

The system in the park stipulates that each person must add at least one rich customer per day and chat more than 100 words. Before entering the park, the park will give business training to newcomers, teach chat skills and judge whether the person has money. The judging criteria are various information such as clothing, food, housing, photos, age and occupation filled in by customers on social software.

In my year in the park, I have not completed a single order. Now, many people know their fraud pattern, so their performance has been declining. There are two or three hundred people in the company, but only 10-20 orders are completed every month. That is to say, it is possible to complete a single order in about 10-20 people, so it is normal that I can't cheat money for a year, and I myself am not willing to actively participate in the fraud.

Training materials: Build your persona and teach scam processes and techniques

Interface News: When you talked about business training above, can you talk about it in detail? (Subsequently, Mr. Zhang sent two documents to Interface News via WeChat, including the Chinese and English version of "Learning Business Chat Records" and "Chat Example" composed of screenshots of scams)

Mr. Zhang: This "Learning of Business Chat Records" records in detail some speech skills and financial business knowledge, judging whether customers have money, and shaping the perfect persona.

(Interface News noted that this "Learning of Business Chat Records" is more than 11,000 words long and is divided into 12 pieces of content.) The whole is divided into three parts: the learning of business expertise, including the knowledge of cryptocurrencies, the understanding and operation of hardware devices during online chats, and the operation methods of fraudulent software; How to shape employees into perfect personalities, including resume, zodiac sign, age, height and weight, marriage, family members, etc., the basic personal information and speech skills involved, the document has clear guidance and delicate language; The final part is the process and tips on how to introduce investment scams from emotional chat. The document divides the scam process into customer screening, greeting, how to organize customers for notes, chat outlines, story editing to gain trust, bringing in investments, etc.)

(For example, there is a paragraph in the document that says: we are novelists, editors of the storyline, and we need to present our own value in the process of chatting, for example, you like to cook some food at home, you always learn food knowledge from my aunt, for example, the last your driver drove too fast; Once drank and drove and you fired it. Now how is your driver, today you go to the hospital, you go to the police station, you just have a huge network market, P picture and celebrity dinner, party, what you have to do is to show your own strength, how to make others trust you, no matter how good the chat is meaningless, you can not easily show off your wealth, in other words, it is you, someone has been showing off wealth with you, you will be disgusted, the mystery is the most conjecture, just like I just inadvertently told you, yesterday I had dinner with the governor, and the photo sent to you such an effect is the most effective and direct. ）

Another document, "Chat Examples", shows the whole process of fraud through a specific case. The scammers portray themselves as Anna, a 38-year-old Asian woman, and gradually lead her into a scam trap by chatting with Allen, a 69-year-old white retired man.

In the chat screenshot, you can more intuitively perceive the scammer's routine. The scammers set up their jobs as "network technology companies in California's Silicon Valley", and talked about their jobs through bursting photos and verbal praise, naturally and naturally leading the topic to investment.

Interface News: In addition to the above documents, are there other fraud training carried out in the park?

Mr. Zhang: In addition to letting us see documents, we also have daily meetings or arrange fixed times for us to study, usually after lunch. Managers will analyze the performance of each of us during this time or today through blackboard explanations. He will proactively ask employees with good chat skills to share their experiences, just like the document you just saw, how to successfully bring customers into the direction of investment through chat.

Internal structure: in a pyramid pattern, there are clear rewards and punishments

Interface News: Are there many people working in the park Chinese? What age group is it?

Mr. Zhang: There are at least 4,000 people in the park, most of them are Chinese, and there are also people from some countries such as Southeast Asia. Most of the Chinese are 20-30 years old, and fewer people are over 30 years old and younger than 20 years old.

Interface News: With so many people in the park, how is the division of labor between superiors and subordinates?

Mr. Zhang: The main thing in the park is a fraud group called H Group, which is divided into more than a dozen branches, each branch has two or three hundred people, and then each company is divided into several groups, and the group is divided into several groups. Graded layer by layer, each group has about 10 people.

There are two or three hundred people in my branch, and I am a team member, the team leader at the top, the group leader at the top, and the company manager at the top. The head of the regiment and the company manager are responsible for business operations.

Interface News: Will the park impose penalties on those who do not complete their performance?

Mr. Zhang: Yes. If the tasks assigned by the hierarchy are not completed, punishments will be imposed, mainly corporal punishment and fines. Corporal punishment includes running, push-ups, etc., and must be done continuously for more than an hour. In severe cases, people will be beaten, usually with wooden sticks.

Of course, the most are fines, mainly deducted from wages. Wages are mainly paid through performance commissions, and a large number of people are not paid because they do not have performance, which will accumulate the penalty into the payment payment. In fact, most people in the park can release people as long as they pay a ransom of more than 100,000 yuan, but most people can only continue to stay in the park because of family difficulties and cannot make up the ransom.

There is a similar role of "system supervisor" in the park, who is responsible for managing and punishing "disobedient" employees. If certain "rules" in the park are broken (such as no leakage, no romance, no photography or chat with real-name software, etc.), the supervisor will punish the employee.

The punishment was imposed at a self-proclaimed "military station" in the park, similar to a private prison. In April of this year, I was imprisoned in the "military station" because I was chatting with my girlfriend and they thought there was a leak.

I was locked up with a few people in a small house of forty or fifty square meters, the "military station". We were all handcuffed and fined for standing for more than ten hours a day. The room was very stuffy, and people who stayed inside had no idea how long they would be outside, and could only be judged by the light outside. In addition, the time of eating is not fixed, basically one meal a day.

Later, I learned that those who violated relatively minor violations would be detained for about a week, and those who were more serious would be detained for half a month, a month, or even a month. I was detained for 1 month, and then I was put in a single dormitory for 2 months.

Interface News: For individual employees who sign large orders, what kind of rewards will park leaders implement?

Mr. Zhang: The company will hold a commendation meeting for individual employees who have defrauded large orders, and let the employee beat the drum on stage and distribute Thai baht cash at the conference site. In my company, for example, every month, the company can only cheat 10-20 orders, each at least $5,000, or maybe millions of dollars. They give their employees a maximum of 12%. Moreover, such employees cannot save money, and the middle and senior management in the park will find ways to let the employees who earn money spend it in other industries in the park.

Other industries in the park are also sources of income for businesses. Supermarkets, restaurants, KTV and other commercial areas in the park can make money. As I said above, the restaurant food and supermarket items in the park are very expensive, and the price is four or five times that of the outside.

Rescued and returned home: The thrilling journey to Myanmar is finally over

Interface News: How were you rescued?

Mr. Zhang: Since August this year, the domestic media has continued to pay attention to telecom network fraud, which has put certain public pressure on the park. At the same time, my family in China also contacted the volunteers through the media, and then the volunteers consulted with the people in the park. The park asked my family to pay a ransom of 59,000 yuan and promised to release him.

The final negotiated ransom price was halved from the original 120,000 yuan. After entering the park, we will sign the contract period. If you come through a passport, the contract period is one year; If it is smuggled, the signing period is one and a half years. When the contract expires, the ransom is reduced by half. Previously, I was also desperate and very irritable during the period when I was locked up. Later, because of the attention of domestic public opinion, my hope of returning to China was rekindled.

On August 24, the park's car dropped me off at the Thai-Myanmar border, and I used the money I had left to buy a mobile phone and a calling card to get in touch with the Chinese Embassy in Thailand. Due to the overdue Thai visa, the follow-up repatriation process took more than ten days. At 6 a.m. on September 5, I arrived at Shanghai Pudong Airport. This thrilling trip to Myanmar is over.

Interface News: How is your mental state now? What has changed before entering the park?

Mr. Zhang: At present, the spirit is back to normal, and it is not as stressful as before. At that time, I was eager to make money before entering the park, but now I see it clearly and want to take my time.

Interface News: Some netizens said before that doctors can also be scammed. What do you think of this sound?

Mr. Zhang: It's normal to think differently, because most people don't know much about the fraud industry, so there will be some misunderstandings.

Interface News: What are your plans for the future?

Mr. Zhang: At present, my teachers and classmates are also helping me find a job. For the future, I am more inclined to be an editor of an academic journal or do popular science publicity for this major.