Cambodian lawmakers unanimously approved a new law in March targeting online fraud operations with life in prison.
BANGKOK (AP) — U.S. officials have announced an all-out crackdown Southeast Asian Cyber Operations as part of what U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro characterized Friday as a “new theater of war” launched by the Trump administration against Chinese transnational organized crime.
The crackdown, led by a US government fraud center strike force, involves the Treasury Department sanctioning a prominent lawmaker and 28 other people and companies accused of operating from Cambodia. Criminal charges were also filed against two Chinese nationals involved in a similar operation in Myanmar.
The initiative includes an order to seize and shut down a major online recruiting channel on the Telegram messaging app and freeze hundreds of millions of dollars in illicit assets, Pirro said in a virtual news conference connecting him from Washington with reporters in Asia.
Cybercrime has flourished in Southeast Asia in recent years, particularly in Cambodia and Myanmarwith illegal operations making huge profits from victims around the world, according to United Nations experts and other analysts. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Americans lost nearly $21 billion to cybercrime and online fraud in 2025 alone.
The illegal industry is closely involved in human trafficking, with foreign nationals employed to run romance and cryptocurrency scams, often after being recruited with false offers of legitimate work and then forced to work in near-slavery conditions.
The fraud center’s strike force consists of Pirro’s U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division, the FBI and the U.S. Secret Service.
The most prominent target of the crackdown is Kok An, a Cambodian senator and prominent businessman described by the Treasury Department as the “king of the fraud center.”
The Department of Foreign Assets Control announced sanctions against Kok An and associates for their roles in a scheme that allegedly defrauded American citizens of millions of dollars. They include freezing Kok An’s assets in the United States and barring American entities from doing business with it.
The Associated Press was unable to reach Kok An or any of his representatives for comment.
“His Excellency Kok An is a Cambodian senator and he was elected and as a senator he has parliamentary immunity,” said Chea Thyrith, a spokesman for the Cambodian Senate, who added that only the US side could speak clearly about the sanctions.
Kok An is at least the second Cambodian senator to be sanctioned by the U.S. In 2024, Washington acted against another top tycoon, Ly Yong Phatwho was also accused of being involved in forced labor, human trafficking and lucrative online scams.
Pirro said the latest crackdown was set in motion in November when FBI agents sent to Thailand came across a trove of evidence seized from an abandoned fraud center in Myanmar, including more than 8,000 phones and 1,500 computers.
This led to wire fraud conspiracy charges against two Chinese nationals, Huang Xing Shan and Jiang Wen Jie, who were managers of the complex before seeking to relocate their operations to Cambodia. They are being held by Thai authorities on immigration violations and the US is seeking their extradition, Pirro said.
Cambodian lawmakers unanimously approved a new law in March targeting online fraud operations up to life in prison, following a government pledge to close the centers until the end of April.
In January, Cambodia extradited another suspected fraud kingpin, Chen Zhithe founder of business and banking conglomerate Prince Holding Group, even though US authorities had sought his detention after indicting him last year for allegedly running a major fraud operation.
By GRANT PECK Associated Press
Sopheng Cheang in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and Michael Kunelman in Washington contributed to this report.
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