JOHOR BARU: Massive police raids in and around Forest City in Iskandar Puteri have netted more than 330 people – mostly foreigners – for involvement in two major illegal call centres linked to scams.
The raids, believed to be part of the country’s largest crackdown on call centres, involved operations at dozens of luxury apartments and bungalows in recent days.
It is learnt that the two call centres had duped victims in China, Indonesia, Japan, the United States and Europe.
Sources said police seized electronic devices and other equipment including desktops, laptops, mobile phones and other paraphernalia worth almost RM2mil in both operations.
In the first case, police uncovered a syndicate that had taken over almost five floors of luxury apartments, spanning more than two dozen units, to carry out their illegal activities.
The victims were mainly Chinese and Indonesian nationals.
“They allegedly made huge amounts of money through various scams, including love scams, currency scams and cryptocurrency scams, targeting mainly senior citizens,” the sources said.
The men and women arrested were mainly from China, Indonesia and Myanmar.
The official said to date, the police have seized more than 800 laptops and mobile phones, and various other paraphernalia valued at almost RM1mil from the raids.
In the second operation, raids on several bungalows led to the arrest of 53 Chinese nationals believed to have been involved in scams targeting victims in China, Japan, Europe and the United States.
“Each house was assigned victims from a specific country, and most of the scams involved investments, cryptocurrency and impersonating law firms.”
Police also seized almost 1,000 computers and mobile phones worth more than RM1mil from the premises.
Initial investigations showed that each syndicate member had entered Malaysia from a neighbouring country and had only been in the country for the past few weeks.
Sources said each suspect was promised a salary of up to RM4,000 per month, with additional commissions for those who met targets.
At press time, it remains unclear whether the two syndicates are linked.
The sweeping arrests came just days after the Network School controversy, which saw the facility ordered to close on July 22 for failing to comply with business licence conditions.
When contacted, a senior police official confirmed the arrests were linked to two major call centre raids around Iskandar Puteri.
The official said that the suspects, aged in their 20s to 50s, have been remanded, and investigations are underway for cheating and violations of the Immigration Act as many did not possess the proper travel documents.
