Foreign scammers are often using human trafficking victims, Tommy Pigott, principal deputy spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, said during an interview on Breitbart News Daily.
Speaking about these scam centers – many of which are in Southeast Asia – and the need for international cooperation on the issue, Pigott said many of the workers are actually human trafficking victims, who have no choice but to participate.
“We’re seeing this cooperation on a security effort, on the law enforcement effort, that’s allowing us to target these centers, and it really is international, because … these operational centers oftentimes use human trafficking victims in order to operate these scam centers,” Pigott said. “They’re really insidious operations, so it requires a lot of coordination across borders.”
When asked why other countries would want to help stop the scam centers given how much money they could get from doing it, Pigott said it comes down to the fact that these are “transnational criminal organizations – not run by people from these countries.”
“And oftentimes, the people actually in these operational centers … are human trafficking victims that are stuck there, that aren’t profiting themselves from these centers,” he explained.
“That’s why these are really insidious – insidious for targeting the American people, stealing life savings from people, promising these fraudulent investments in romance and friendship. But then oftentimes, the people that are actually on the phone or texting are being forced to do this by criminals, by transnational criminal organizations,” Pigott emphasized.
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So there is coordination from other governments, Pigott said, given the number of people these scam centers are hurting.
“It’s hurting their citizens. It’s hurting the United States. We basically saw a lot of casino operations during COVID switch over to this new quote unquote business operation, which is really just stealing things,” he added. “And we’re seeing, really, this expand and grow into a way that’s hurting a lot of people.”
Breitbart News Daily airs on SiriusXM Patriot 125 from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.