At the beginning of the month, 22-year-old Wang Xing received an invitation to a movie being filmed in Thailand and flew to Bangkok. Like hundreds of other Chinese men, Wang Xing was deceived by an "incredibly good" job offer and fell into the trap of a criminal gang.
According to Wang Xing's account and statements from Chinese and Thai police, he, like other people desperately in need of work, was kidnapped and taken across the border to Myanmar, where he was forced to work at an online scam center.
However, unlike most trafficked Chinese citizens, Wang Xing had a strong supporter back home.
Wang Xing's girlfriend, Jia Jia, exposed his ordeal on social media and documented her struggle to get Wang Xing back to China, attracting the attention and support of millions of fans and Chinese celebrities.
On January 7, Wang Xing was rescued by Thai police. According to Thai police, Wang Xing was found in Myanmar, but details of his release were not disclosed. Meanwhile, relatives of other Chinese still detained in Myanmar's scam centers began to publicly share detailed information about their kidnapped family members online, hoping to draw more attention.
Within a few days, this rare civilian action collected a list of nearly 1,800 Chinese citizens, described by their families as victims trafficked from the China-Thailand border area to Myanmar. Since the Myanmar military took power through a coup in 2021, the local situation has been chaotic, with ongoing civil war and rampant scam gangs, and workers in these centers often suffer brutal treatment.
UN data shows that since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, hundreds of thousands of people have been trafficked to scam centers in Southeast Asia, a industry that deceives people globally and generates billions of dollars a year for organized crime groups, many of which are from China.
This statistical data has been submitted to the relevant Chinese authorities, becoming the most detailed investigation of deceived victims to date. Most of these victims come from towns like Myawaddy on the Myanmar-Thailand border, lured to online scam centers.
Last Friday, China's Ministry of Public Security stated that it is "making every effort" to combat scam gangs and "rescue trafficked persons." China National Radio reported on Tuesday that Beijing has reached a consensus with Thailand and Myanmar to arrest the leaders of scam gangs and eradicate scam centers.
After a surge in cross-border crimes targeting Chinese citizens, Beijing launched a large-scale crackdown on Myanmar scam gangs in 2023, arresting tens of thousands of Chinese citizens suspected of involvement in illegal transactions. This also reflects China's attitude towards trafficked individuals, increasingly treating them as suspects rather than victims.
Mina Chiang, founder of the anti-human trafficking organization "Humanity Research Consultancy," said: "It is difficult to confirm the exact number of Chinese people trafficked to scam sites."
According to interviews with four relatives of missing persons, their names have been confirmed to appear in the victim database, named after Wang Xing's surname "Xing." These relatives are reluctant to reveal their full names, fearing that angering the authorities could delay rescue efforts.
The "Star Homecoming" campaign, which recorded nearly 1,800 victims, found that about 93% are male, with an average age of 27, and the vast majority are between 15 and 45 years old. They were mostly lured due to economic difficulties, burdened with debt, struggling in the gig economy, or unemployed due to economic downturns.
However, according to an analysis of the crowdsourced spreadsheet, Chinese law does not consider men as potential victims of human trafficking, preventing many families from filing missing person reports. The wife of a 30-year-old man said: "At first I wanted to report to the police, but they said missing person reports are only for women and children."
The wife of a 22-year-old missing electrician said that the police refused to file a case because her husband had his passport with him.
Several relatives of victims expressed their hope that by publicizing these cases, they could force the Chinese government to intensify efforts to bring trafficking victims back to the country.
Last week, when the organizers of "Star Homecoming" closed the spreadsheet and prohibited further collection of new names, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs also called on Southeast Asian countries to strengthen cooperation to combat scam gangs.
After his release, actor Wang Xing thanked the Chinese government and also mentioned in a media interview that his girlfriend Jia Jia had left a hair tie in his luggage, which warmed his heart. He said: "She asked me to turn down the job, but I ended up going anyway."
