Southeast Asia’s cyber scams hit $37B, AI fuels new risks
Southeast Asia is slammed with massive cyber scams, mixing high-tech fraud and human trafficking. Cambodia and Myanmar host criminal syndicates running huge “pig butchering” scam centers. Trafficked workers are forced to scam victims in richer markets like Singapore and Hong Kong.
One UN report estimates losses hit a staggering $37 billion—and it’s getting worse. 
The fallout is political. Thailand reports fewer Chinese tourists after a Chinese actor was kidnapped for forced scam work in Myanmar. Singapore just passed a law letting cops freeze scam victims’ bank accounts.
Okta’s Asia-Pacific GM Ben Goodman says the region’s “mobile-first” culture is a perfect breeding ground. Popular apps like WhatsApp, Line, and WeChat connect scammers directly to targets.
AI’s also pushing scams further. Goodman points to machine translation making it easier to trick people across Asia’s many languages, enticing victims to click bad links or approve scams.
Nation-states add to the mess. North Korean agents reportedly pose as tech employees to scam and gather intel while bringing cash into their isolated country.
A new headache: “shadow” AI at work
Goodman warns about rogue AI use at companies—employees going outside official apps to use ChatGPT or other AI on personal accounts. This opens up a floodgate for confidential info leaks.
“That could be someone preparing a presentation for a business review, going into ChatGPT on their own personal account, and generating an image,” Goodman explained.
He added the blurry line between personal and corporate AI use creates risks.
“I never use my personal profile for a corporate service, and I never use my corporate profile for personal service,” Goodman said.
“The ability to delineate who you are, whether it’s at work and using work services or in life and using your own personal services, is how we think about customer identity versus corporate identity.”
AI agents making decisions for users complicates identity too. If stolen, a human’s digital ID could lead to massive damage quickly, Goodman warned.
“If your human identity is ever stolen, the blast radius in terms of what can be done quickly to steal money from you or damage your reputation is much greater,” he said.
Courtesy of Okta
