Unraveling the Nexus: OSINT Tools and the Battle Against Human Trafficking, Money Laundering, and Cybercrime

The interconnection of human trafficking, money laundering, and cybercrime

When human trafficking occurs, it is often entangled with other crimes, such as cybercrime and money laundering.

Human trafficking and cybercrime

Traffickers frequently utilize technology and the internet to coordinate their operations and recruit potential victims. Common cyber tactics used to lure victims include phishing, social engineering, and online advertising. Traffickers use these tactics to target their victims, facilitate their movement, cover their operations, and evade law enforcement.

Human trafficking and money laundering

Human trafficking produces significant illicit profits that need laundering to process them into the legal economy. Traffickers use a variety of methods to conceal illegal profits, such as shell companies or real estate investments. Additionally, traffickers use multiple financial institutions across different borders to relay multiple transactions to disguise their tracks. [1]

What is human trafficking, cybercrime, and money laundering?  

Human trafficking is the act of “recruiting, harboring or obtaining” a person for labor “through the use of force, fraud, or coercion.” [2] These crimes often involve crossing international borders, and targeting and exploiting vulnerable people and/or populations, according to the United Nations. Victims of human trafficking can be physically forced into providing commercial sex or labor for little-to-no money. They are often held captive in inhumane environments. It is very common for victims of human trafficking to be forced into performing online fraud and victimizing others.

Money laundering facilitates the concealment of illegally obtained funds from illicit activities, such as drug trafficking, corruption, embezzlement, or gambling. This process is often done by passing funds through a sequence of banking transfers or commercial transactions.

Cybercrime encompasses a wide range of illegal activities committed via digital devices and networks. There are many ways criminals target victims, such as email and internet fraud, identity theft, and theft of financial or card payment data. It is the fastest growing type of crime worldwide. [3]  

Challenges faced by law enforcement and government agencies

With the increasing complexity of these crimes, law enforcement and government agencies continue to face a growing list of challenges that prevent them from catching the perpetrators.

The dark web - Traffickers have grown increasingly sophisticated, using highly organized networks and the dark web to make their activities difficult to detect and their operations challenging to trace.

Cross-border nature – These crimes often transcend national borders, complicating the already challenging task of tracking and prosecuting offenders. Convicting individuals becomes particularly difficult due to the differences in legal systems, jurisdictions, and varying interpretations of what constitutes permissible actions across countries and regions.

Underreported crime - Traffickers often target individuals who are less likely to be reported as “missing.” Consequently, many of their crimes go unreported. Additionally, human trafficking victims are often hesitant to speak out for various reasons, including fear of retaliation, feelings of shame, and distrust of law enforcement. Without awareness of these crimes, law enforcement cannot take further action.

Southeast Asia and online scams

Many organized criminal groups, often originating from China, operate their cyber scam centers in Southeast Asia, mainly in the poorer countries. Between Myanmar and Cambodia, two of the worst countries for human trafficking, “The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights estimates that more than two hundred thousand people have been trafficked... to execute these online scams.” [4]

Cambodia has been a particular problem. Certain actions of the Cambodian government have created environments that are rife for human trafficking. (Its 2022 forced relocation of more than 10,000 families from Angkor to ill-equipped and ill-governed resettlement sites is one example.[5]) The Trafficking in Persons Report, a publication of the U.S. Department of State, notes that the Cambodian government has recently expended significant effort to reduce human trafficking.[6] Still, the publication’s ranking system gives Cambodia its lowest grade for its ability to meet Trafficking Victims Protection Act standards for the reduction and elimination of that crime.[7]

The cyber-scam industry’s shift towards human trafficking intensified when online gambling became illegal in Cambodia in 2019, which drastically decreased casino and hotel revenues. In 2020, the Chinese government implemented new restrictions due to Covid that forced many Chinese expats to return home and prevented individuals from traveling abroad for work or vacation — this also negatively impacted normal streams of revenue. Owners of hotels and casinos collaborated with criminal groups to transform the unused properties into scamming compounds. Since there was an exit of individuals who voluntarily participated in these cyber scams, it led cyber criminals to turn to human trafficking to staff their operations. [8]

These scam operators post job openings for positions with attractive salaries and target victims with exploitable skills. Once victims arrive, their passports are confiscated and traffickers coerce the individual into committing crimes through “physical and sexual abuse, restrictions on movement, and starvation.” [9]

A true story

Vietnamese native Ly Thi Lan was one of the thousands of victims of this intertwined crime. When a job opportunity promising easy work and good pay appeared on her computer, Lan believed it was a smart move. However, upon arriving in Cambodia, she quickly realized that this was not the typical administrative job described. Lan was "forced to carry out romance-style scams centered around a fake online shop" using a strategy known as pig-butchering. With this strategy, perpetrators contact their targets online and engage in flirtatious conversations to build trust. They lure the victims into investing small amounts of money in fake investments that seem real at first, and, over time, persuade them to invest larger sums, which they ultimately do not get back.

Lan was forced to work between 14 and 16 hours a day, attract two new “customers” every five days, and was required to earn 300 million dong ($12,653) for the company per month. If these demands were not met, “the company would beat [them], or send [them] to the eighth floor to electrocute [them].” [10]

Lan eventually got out, escaping the abandoned casino with about 40 of her colleagues.

Government and institutional responses

The U.S. Department of State has made, and continues to make, preventing human trafficking a priority. The National Action Plan “outlines a three-year comprehensive approach to reduce human trafficking, including actions to strengthen prosecution of traffickers, enhance victim protections, and prevent the crime occurring within our borders and abroad.” [11] In the past six years, the United States Congress has worked to pass several comprehensive bills designed to further enable the federal government to continue the fight against human trafficking. Some of the bills that have been passed include the original Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000, and its subsequent reauthorizations (most recently in 2017), and The Frederick Douglass Trafficking Victims Prevention and Protection Reauthorization Act of 2018. [12]

According to the State Department report, steps taken by the Cambodian government to address human trafficking in the past year included opening a victim support center, cooperating with foreign governments on anti-trafficking investigations, and launching an online trafficking victim identification training course for government officials. High-level officials from Cambodia recently met with Australian counterparts to discuss enhancing their national police management and cybercrime training initiatives. Cambodia’s cooperation and engagement with neighboring countries are crucial aspects that can bolster their efforts towards becoming a more cyber-resilient and secure nation. [13]

The role of open source intelligence (OSINT) tools

These interconnected crimes can be detected and prevented by providing law enforcement and government agencies with OSINT tools for accessing and analyzing vast amounts of data.

Experienced analysts can enter known keywords related to human trafficking and filter results to a manageable set. For example, results could be filtered by time period, linked with specific events, or tied to certain geographies. AI-powered analysis can illuminate patterns of crimes that may not be seen easily by human analysts due to the sheer volume of the data.

Conclusion

The interconnected nature of human trafficking, cybercrime, and money laundering presents profound challenges to law enforcement and governments worldwide. These illicit activities exploit vulnerabilities across borders and use advanced technologies to evade detection. The stories of victims like Ly Thi Lan highlight the brutal realities faced by those ensnared in these criminal networks, underscoring the urgent need for comprehensive international cooperation and innovative strategies.

Efforts such as the U.S. National Action Plan and Cambodia's initiatives demonstrate steps towards combatting these crimes, but more robust measures and resources are required to effectively dismantle these global operations and protect vulnerable populations. Embracing technologies like open source intelligence tools offers promising avenues for detection and prevention, yet sustained commitment and collaboration remain essential in the ongoing fight against these pervasive and interconnected crimes.

End Notes

1. Ingo Steinhaeuser, “Special Report: The hidden links between human trafficking and the insurance sector,” accessed July 2024, https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en-us/posts/human-trafficking/special-report-human-trafficking-insurance-sector-

2. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, “Human Trafficking,” accessed July 2024, https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-Trafficking/Human-Trafficking.html

3. Stuart Clarke, “Applying Open Source Intelligence to Cyber Crime Investigations,” accessed July 2024, https://blackdotsolutions.com/blog/cyber-crime-investigation/

4. Clara Fong and Abigail McGowan, “How Myanmar Became a Global Center for Cyber Scams,” accessed July 2024, https://www.cfr.org/in-brief/how-myanmar-became-global-center-cyber-scams

5. Amnesty International, “Cambodia 2023,” accessed July 2024, https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/asia-and-the-pacific/south-east-asia-and-the-pacific/cambodia/report-cambodia/

6. U.S. Department of State, “Trafficking in Persons Report,” accessed July 2024, https://www.state.gov/trafficking-in-persons-report/

7. U.S. Department of Justice, “Key Legislation,” accessed July 2024, https://www.justice.gov/humantrafficking/key-legislation#:~:text=The%20Trafficking%20Victims%20Protection%20Act%20of%202000%20(TVPA)%2C%20Pub,of%20slavery%20domestically%20and%20internationally.

8. Lauren Burke, Liam Hamama and Marti Flacks, “Cyber Scamming as a New Destination for Human Trafficking Victims,” accessed July 2024, https://www.csis.org/analysis/cyber-scamming-new-destination-human-trafficking-victims

9. Lauren Burke, Liam Hamama and Marti Flacks, “Cyber Scamming as a New Destination for Human Trafficking Victims,” accessed July 2024, https://www.csis.org/analysis/cyber-scamming-new-destination-human-trafficking-victims

10. Rebecca Ratcliffe, Nhung Nguyen and Navaon Siradapuvadol, “Sold to gangs, forced to run online scams: inside Cambodia’s cybercrime crisis,” accessed July 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/oct/10/sold-to-gangs-forced-to-run-online-scams-inside-cambodias-cybercrime-crisis

11. The White House, “The National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking,” accessed July 2024, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/National-Action-Plan-to-Combat-Human-Trafficking.pdf

12. U.S. Department of Justice, “Key Legislation,” accessed July 2024, https://www.justice.gov/humantrafficking/key-legislation

13. Will Jackson, “US Trafficking in Persons report says Cambodian officials complicit in human trafficking for online scams,” accessed June 2024, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-27/us-report-cambodia-complicit-human-trafficking-online-scams/104020954