BI Reveals Call Center Agents Victimized by Human Trafficking Suffers Physical Abuse
The Bureau of Immigration (BI) revealed that call center agents victimized by human trafficking suffered physical abuse.
According to BI Commissioner Norman Tansingco, the most recent group of repatriates are all victims of human trafficking who were famished and tortured by their employers in Bangkok. The seven victims, who arrived from Bangkok on Monday, worked as cryptocurrency scammers in Mae Sot, Thailand.
The victims described being starved, electrocuted, and beaten with PVC pipes for failing to satisfy the quota of investors in the phony investment scam. According to BI, all seven victims were vacationers who departed the nation for Bangkok or Singapore last year.
Three other victims were repatriated from Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on April 1 after being victims of the same syndicate. According to the Travel Control and Enforcement Unit (TCEU), one of the passengers last left the country in 2019 as an overseas Filipino worker (OFW) to the UAE, while the other two were a couple who left the country in August last year, posing as tourists going on a honeymoon in Thailand.
Based on the report, they were hired as Customer Service Representatives in Cambodia with the expectation of earning $1200 to $1500 USD a month. The OFW revealed that he was given a free flight from Dubai to Cambodia but was compelled to work for a fraudulent online shopping business aimed towards Filipinos before being sold to a cryptocurrency fraudster.
He was then sold to another company to operate as a love scammer for which he was not compensated. Tansingco presented the story of a couple who worked under unfair conditions as customer service representatives for a virtual shopping company that paid out large sums to clients.
The couple managed to flee their workplace and were assisted in obtaining leave clearances by the Philippine Embassy in Phnom Penh. All of the victims were found through social media.
Tansingco, on the other hand, expressed his dissatisfaction with the happenings. Tansingco also cautioned the public to only deal with trustworthy organizations when looking for jobs abroad. When the returning victims arrived, they were met by authorities from the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration.
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