Philippines Targets Company Linked to Alleged Crypto Scams

PAGCOR, the country’s regulator, has conducted a series of operations that have focused on clamping down on such activities, with the latest taking place in Las Piñas City in Metro Manila where the Philippine National Police raided a business and ordered an offshore gaming service provider to stop business with immediate activity.

Clamping Down on the POGO Sector Harder

According to a statement issued by authorities and cited by local media outlets, the business in question has to do with Xinchuang Network Technology, Inc. The business is allegedly involved with what the regulator and police suspect is both human trafficking and cryptocurrency scams.

The latter usually takes place in the form of “pig-butchering scams.” In those cases, a victim is approached by a pretend romantic partner. The fake partner continues to ask the victim for money until they cannot pay any longer. PAGCOR said that it had been tipped about the potential offenses and had surveilled the company’s offices for a month before conducting an operation last week.

The operation was a success with police authorities retrieving a staggering number of people – some 1,534 nationals hailing from the Philippines and 1,000 nationals from the region, including countries such as Singapore, Taiwan, China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand. The country has had more than 41,000 illegal arrests in 2023 so far.

During the raid, authorities seized a number of electronic devices and documentation owned by the company and potentially used in the purported scams. PAGCOR chairman and CEO Alejandro H. Tengco welcomed the efforts of law enforcement and his own colleagues.

“As we have always said before, PAGCOR will not hesitate to impose sanctions on erring licensees and accredited service providers,” H. Tengco said.  The official said that PAGCOR will continue to work actively with authorities and police to ensure that its businesses are protected.

POGOs, an Ongoing Apple of Discord in the Region

The series of recent regulatory moves have to do with a toughening on the overall stance into Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations or POGOs which have been coming under a lot of heat from the regulator, but also regional countries’ governments, most prominent amongst which has been that of China.

The Philippines was recently associated with an illegal gambling website which has opportunistically stolen the domain name that was originally intended to celebrate American history in the United States but was hijacked and used to promote dangerous gambling operations instead.