Chinese mafia cyber‑slave expanded

By David Whitehouse

Former triad leader Wan Kuok-koi, alias ‘Broken Tooth’, after his release from prison in Macau, China, on 1 December 2012. (REUTERS/Tyrone Siu)

A Chinese mafia gang called the Hongmen established a presence in South Africa early this year, according to the United States Institute of Peace.

Africa must develop a response to the threat posed by the expansion of Chinese mafia gangs needing to diversify their operations away from Southeast Asia, United States Institute of Peace (USIP) country director for Burma Jason Tower tells The Africa Report.

Tower is a co-author of the USIP report Transnational Crime in Southeast Asia: A Growing Threat to Global Peace and Security published in May. The report finds that Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos are the “epicenter” of the cyber-scamming industry in Southeast Asia which emerged in part because of a ban on gambling in China.

Cyber scams have two kinds of victims. The first is the people who are trapped into working in compounds as slaves under the pretence of legitimate employment. Most of them are Chinese, and this has led to increased pressure from Chinese law enforcement to crack down on the problem.

The second kind is people globally trying to start a relationship online and are tricked into parting with their money. By the end of  2023, the USIP report estimates, Southeast Asia scammers steal $64bn annually from victims worldwide.

The gangs are trying to traffic fewer Chinese victims to work in the compounds as a way to ease the pressure from Chinese law enforcement, Tower says. He points to an “established pattern” of beachheads being set up in new locations. In 2022, a mafia group known as the Hongmen established a branch in Dubai which, Tower says, has been used as a hub for recruiting Africans as cyber-scam slaves. The group, he adds, has also been able to establish connections in Uganda.

Early in 2024, Tower says, the Hongmen established a presence in South Africa. Other Chinese mafia groups have also established bridgeheads in Zambia as well as in Peru, he adds. South Africa “has more capacity” than other countries and needs to play a “leadership role” in raising the issue at the AU, Tower says. Awareness of the issue in Africa, he says, is “extremely low”.

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The danger, Tower adds, is that groups such as the Hongmen will start to establish high-level connections in African countries, replicating the pattern witnessed in Southeast Asia. Africans who speak English are especially valuable replacements for Chinese cyber-slaves as they allow affluent people globally to be targeted. If compounds are established in Africa, then Africans being enslaved in them “won’t even show up on the radar of the Chinese police”, Tower says.

‘Broken Tooth’ sanctioned under Magnitsky legislation

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The Hongmen were a Chinese secret society dating from the 1600s which supported underground political movements. Today, the reference has been adopted as a cover for mafia activity. Its leader Wan Kuok-koi, also known as “Broken Tooth,” was sanctioned under Magnitsky legislation by the US Department of the Treasury in 2020.

Broken Tooth served 14 years in Macau in a purpose-built top-security prison for crimes including attempted murder, weapons trafficking and money laundering. He was released in 2012 and established the World Hongmen History and Culture Association headquarters in Cambodia in 2018.

The association, according to the US Department of the Treasury, is a cover for the 14K Triad, one of the world’s largest Chinese mafia organisations. The association has managed to co-opt elite figures in Cambodia and Malaysia, the Treasury says, so continuing a pattern of overseas Chinese actors trying to “paper over illegal criminal activities by framing their actions in terms of China’s Belt and Road Initiative”.

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The Cambodian government is a close Chinese ally. But Tower says that cyber-scam receipts of about $12.5bn flowing into Cambodia each year mean that “the Chinese mafia has more influence than any Chinese state-owned enterprise” over the regime in Cambodia. The result, Tower says, is that Cambodia supports the Chinese government on a wide range of issues in return for reduced pressure from Beijing to clean up cyber-slavery. It’s a trap he hopes that African countries will avoid falling into.

The South African Hongmen group, Tower says, is headed by Broken Tooth’s right-hand man Zhaohui Bai, who fled Thailand after a police crackdown in 2023. Tower says it’s unlikely that a country such as South Africa with strong institutions would become a centre of cyber-slavery compounds.

The danger is that South Africa, because of its developed financial system, could be used to launder the proceeds, similar to the role currently played by Thailand. Smaller African countries which lack functioning institutions risk being targets for the establishment of new cyber-slavery compounds, he adds.