As Cambodian authorities continue raids on the country’s scam compounds, more escaped foreign workers have reached out seeking help returning to their home countries, and surviving in Cambodia until they can do so. A few of their messages when asked to tell the story of their situations are reprinted below.
The scam crackdown ramped up in January, and is now reaching the far western end of the country, particularly the city of Poipet, in Banteay Meanchey province.
Many foreign workers were trafficked to Cambodian scam compounds from Africa and around the world. Some workers said life in scam compounds was like “hell” — with brutal violence and daily fear.
Things have remained difficult since their escape, with some sleeping on Cambodian streets and forced to beg for food, shelter and clothes.
The Cambodian government has previously said that more than 200,000 foreign workers have left the country amid the scam crackdown, and some have received aid with shelter or buying airplane tickets home.
But as raids continue, the stream of stranded foreign workers who need help hasn’t stopped.
Please reach out by email or on social media if you can lend a hand.
Jonas
My name is Jonas a Ugandan by nationality i was told by a friend that there were jobs in Cambodia to work as a waiter in a hotel and I was going to earn a salary of 1000$ a month, since I was jobless at that time and I was going through a lot I accepted and I was interviewed on zoom and after I was told that I had passed the interview after telling them that I was computer literate they told me I will also help out with reception work, in a period of one week I travel from Uganda on Qatar Airways until I reached Phnom pehn. I was picked by a nice toyata harrier car and they took me to to a place that I came to know that it was called campot, I was received by one chinese and one Malaysian lady into a building I thought it was a hotel because of the branding, when I entered I was shocked to find a lot of people working on computers and at that time they told me I was going to do a scam job I tried to resist because of the repercussions that I know about this job told them I wanted to go home they told me I had to pay them 10000$ which I did not have and never touched before in my life after that they confiscated my passport with the help of bouncers who I got to know that they were Egyptians very huge in size infront of then I looked like a grasshopper, I had nothing to do but to sacum to their demand since the torture that I witnessed was enough for me to do what they wanted me to do. During that time they tortured one boy from Kenya which let to his death and we don’t know we’re he was barried. Coming to Cambodia I took a loan to facilitate my travel and I was promised that once I reach they will refund my money but unfortunately it was in vain.
The situation on my side is not good at all since I escaped from that place life has not been good for me, I’m mentally disturbed and I need help, I’m stuck stranded. I need help
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Since I escaped till now life has been a living hell on my side, turned into a begger for food and clothes, I tried in my strength to reachout to my ambassador but I was told there is no budget at them moment to take me back home, I have slept on streets because of lack of money to rent a room and sometimes have had to eat from the dust bin just to servive.
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I need shelter and food because and also to be helped to go home to meet my family if its possible
Laight
My name is Laight and I am Ugandan by nationality.
I was a victim of scam companies. They told us to come and work, that the job was to offload trucks. It was all lies.
The moment we reached Cambodia, they took our passports. With no documents, we were trapped. They took us to a far place, far from the city, where we had challenges to communicate home. No calls. No messages. For a long time, my family thought I had disappeared.
They didn’t allow us to contact anyone. We were cut off from the world.
If we made any mistake, the punishment was brutal. They used to torture us. They beat us. They used electricity shocks on us until we screamed. They claimed us like we were property, not people. We lived in fear every single day.
The past days I was living a life equivalent to hell. Every day blurred into the next — fear, pain, silence. We were not workers. We were captives.
Then the Chinese running the place heard that the police were coming. In the chaos, we got our passports back and ran away. I just ran.
Right now I really need help, please.
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I escaped 10 days ago and l have been barely surviving l have had to sleep in road side and been helped by Cambodian people with food but for shelter l had to sleep sometimes on roads some times helped its been a lot
And that’s when actually l started seeing Chinese run being chased by police but l thank God l left that place but these days haven’t been good for me
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Shelter and something to eat for that it’s all matters to me at the moment cause l personally l can’t take care of my self even though l reach and am to sleep on the floor it’s ok with me cause it will be atleast something even being brought from poipet to Phnom Penh
Jeff
Jeff is the name given to me. My name is jeff.
I came to Cambodia chasing a job. Clean opportunity. Something I could build on and deliver something back home to my family in Kenya. I’m not uneducated, not desperate without options I’m a graduate of University of Nairobi, with specialization in software engineering. That degree didn’t come easy. Plans I had. Career path. A future I saw clearly.
They sold me a dream so real that I never questioned it. I boarded that plane with the firm belief that my life was finally going to take off.
But it changed. Not in the way I imagined it to be.
Upon arrival, my passport was taken ‘for processing. Not until much later would I again hold it in my hands. After that, everything was control: where I go, what I do, and even my thoughts. I have been transferred to four different companies. I was transferred from four different companies, and none of these companies ever paid me any money. Not even once. When they promise salary, they shift you, threaten you and punish you.
And the punishments are not a joke;
If you don’t meet targets, if you hesitate, if you resist—they beat you. They humiliate you; People are then made examples of, and everyone else is intimidated into silence. I’ve seen stuff like that which I wish my mind could forget. I have seen things that I wish I had never seen and experienced things that I never thought I would experience as a human being.
For now, I am in Poipet. And here, it’s worse than in all the other places I’ve been.
There is no proper place to sleep. There’s no proper place to sleep; sometimes it is a corner of a room, sometimes the floor, and sometimes the sleeper remains awake because he feels safer than having to shut his eyes. There is a feeling that the person is suffocating despite breathing in air. You are always under surveillance. Always controlled; And always afraid.
We work long hours, forced to scam people just to survive another day unscathed by punishment. It eats at your soul. You start losing yourself. I don’t even recognize myself anymore, the person I see has become someone unrecognizable in my struggle to stay alive.
And the most difficult part?
Even if I somehow managed to get out… There is no way for me to get home.
I don’t have an air ticket. I don’t have money. I don’t have an air ticket. I don’t have money. I don’t even have my documents. Kenya is another lifetime away and a place that I only visit with my thoughts. I think about my family every day, what they would say if they saw me like this and what they would do if they knew.
Sometimes I just sit down and ask myself “How did it get this bad?”. How did a simple dream change into this nightmare?
I’m tired; Not only physicallybut deep inside. The kind of tired that comes from fear, from pain, from feeling trapped with no possible way out. But even then, there’s still something in me that refuses to quit.
All I want is to leave. I just want to leave this place and go back home to Kenya. I just want to breathe freely again, sleep without fear, and live like a human being.
If anyone hears this please understand this is real. It is happening. This is not just happening to me, but to many others here.
My name is jeff a graduate, a son, and a human being.
And I just want to go home. There is no other option for me the only salary have gotten here is $200 food and accommodation there is no way I will go home still young to go through this hell fellow brothers am dieing of depression
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By the way am already suffering from nightmares and depression
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I just hope we all fellow brothers and sisters get to live our former lives this hell ain’t for a human being to go through
Allan
My name is Allan Peter, a Ugandan citizen born on 22 July 1993. I was raised by my mother together with my younger brothers and sisters after losing my father several years ago. Life became very difficult for our family, and as the eldest son, I carried the responsibility of helping provide for them.
In 2025 around October, while searching for employment opportunities online, I was contacted through Facebook by a person claiming to work for an international IT company in Cambodia. The recruiter promised me a good job with a monthly salary between $900 and $1,300. I was told that accommodation, transport, food, visa processing, and flight expenses would all be covered, except for a small recruitment fee that I had to contribute.
After several conversations, communication was moved to Telegram. I was later sent travel documents, including a visa and flight ticket, and instructed to prepare for departure in late December.
When I arrived in Cambodia late at night, I was immediately told to delete all chats, contacts, and communication records from my phone. A van picked 5 of us up from the airport, and together with several other Africans, we traveled for many hours to an unknown location. The driver did not communicate with us, and we had no idea where we were being taken for over 6 hours.
We eventually arrived at a guarded compound surrounded by wall fences and security personnel. Upon entering, our passports were confiscated. We were informed that we could not leave unless we paid $5,000 for “transportation and processing costs.” Our phones and movements were heavily monitored, and we were not allowed to contact family members freely.
After a few days of training, I realized the job was not related to IT as promised. Instead, we were being forced to scam people online by pretending to build romantic relationships and convincing victims to invest money into fake cryptocurrency and trading platforms. The compound housed hundreds of workers from different countries, many of whom had also been deceived.
When I refused to cooperate and demanded to leave, I was threatened and intimidated. On one occasion, after attempting to escape, I was caught by security guards, beaten, and locked in a dark room for several one week. I sustained injuries on my back and arm, some of which still left marks on my body. Out of fear for my safety, I continued working under pressure.
I officially started working in early Jan 2026 and was promised payment every month. However, each payday came with excuses. First, I was told I was still under probation, then later informed that my salary had been deducted for food and accommodation expenses. Despite working long hours every day, I received almost nothing.
In January, chaos erupted after rumors spread that authorities were approaching the compound. Supervisors and managers escaped, abandoning workers inside. During the confusion, many of us forced open office drawers and lockers searching for our passports. Fortunately, I managed to recover mine before fleeing.
After escaping, I spent several weeks stranded in Cambodia without money, food, or shelter. I moved between provinces, sometimes sleeping outside buildings and surviving on occasional support from fellow Africans and kind strangers. Some Ugandans living in Cambodia later organized efforts to help victims seek assistance from authorities.
Although an overstay waiver was eventually granted, I still had no money for a ticket home. My family had already borrowed heavily to support me, including the money used to pay the recruitment agent. My mother struggled to raise additional funds from her small saving group so I could return home before the amnesty period expired.
Even now, life remains uncertain. I carry emotional trauma, physical scars, and heavy financial burdens. Returning home means facing debts and the painful reality of starting over with nothing.
I share my story to warn others, especially young people desperate for jobs abroad. Many criminal networks use social media platforms to lure victims with fake employment offers. These operations are dangerous, abusive, and continue to exploit vulnerable people searching for a better future.
I urge everyone to carefully verify overseas job offers and avoid trusting promises that appear unrealistically attractive online. I said all these seeking for help form any well wisher to help me return home and meet my family.
For God and my Country , Uganda
Pauline
I’m Pauline Angel Namuddu I’m 20 years old and I’m Ugandan
I came to Cambodia after being promised a job opportunity. When I arrived, the situation was not as promised. I was misled about the job and I was not paid for my work. Working 16hrs a day, having bad meals I couldn’t even feed well , they beat people , do squats if you have a mistake, they fine your salary even after sarving punishment, they use teasers on boys and ladies do squats, i leaved a miserable life , I have trauma, I got ulcers , I regret leaving school for this , leaving life without friends not even talking to family because our phones where confiscated. I got a chance to move out because of these raids but unfortunately with nothing like no money to buy food and a ticket to go home I feel bad that i didn’t fulfill my promises I made to the siblings and myself, my passport was confiscated lying to me that they are going to put for me visa they didn’t do anything I’ve over stayed my visa, now I do not have any support.
Matovu
My name is Matovu Ashraf, I’m as well a victim of the scam compounds. The whole story began when I was told by a friend that there was an opportunity of going to Cambodia to work as factory workers and that he was as well recommended by a friend whom was at the moment in the accommodation which was in Uganda where we were all gathered before they could process for our visas and flight tickets and he urged me to join since the pay was a good one about $1200 if at all you work for the whole month without days off but incase of any issue for example, sickness you could receive $1000 which opportunity I thought about and it was really making sense. As soon as I agreed, we were told to me make medical tests which I did and later on joined the dormitory. I found some other members of whom some where from Rwanda and Kenya. They started working on our documents to our agreed destination which was Cambodia but things started worrying as we were driven out of the city about 6 hours from the Capital city “Phenom Pen”
We were taken to place which was heavily guarded and the driver had to first talk to someone on phone before the guards could let us inside after like 40-1hour of waiting in a car, they finally allowed the car to get it and it was something like a residential area popularity known as parks having a lot of buildings all around. We got to another gate which was a check point as well well at which point we were asked to refund the money they had given to us as airport clearance (show money) which we refunded without hesitation since we had started getting scared of the whole situation. We got in, we were given where to sleep and everything that basically was needed like bathing soap, tooth paste and the likes so we inquired from the ones we found in the rooms we were assigned to and what they told us, was a really different story since we had reached late in the night we rested and got up in morning to go see what exactly was the job. We landed our eyes on a big room full of computers then we knew it was not what we opted for work. There patrolled bouncers on top of the regular guards even and every time, if found doing something contrary to work, you could get beat up Infront of everyone by the bouncers and get back to work right after no matter you were bleeding or hurt in anyway. By the grace of the Lord after like one and a half months, there happened a raid on the building by the police an d that’s how we managed to escape and now its’ about 3 months since I have been moving around in Cambodia I used up the money that was paid in the month then started calling back home for some money to survive but they couldn’t send me money regularly all they could tell me was to go back home but they don’t actually know how hard it is. So I’m here asking for help.