Sri Lanka-based investment scammers target Japanese: ex-local worker

An organization in Sri Lanka posing as an IT company is recruiting locals who speak Japanese to target Japanese nationals with investment scams, a local who briefly worked there has told Kyodo News.

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While the extent of the damage caused by the phone scammers is unknown, the former worker said in an interview last month that he heard that some victims had transferred as much as 30 million yen ($192,000) to the organization’s account from Japan.

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There have been a series of phone and online fraud committed by Japanese scammers based in Southeast Asian countries, but cases in South Asia involving locals hired to victimize people in Japan appear to be rare.

The Sri Lankan man, who is fluent in Japanese after having worked in Japan, said the organization in Colombo, the capital, appeared to involve more than 100 workers, though apparently without any Japanese among them.

He quit the job as he was hesitant to be engaged in defrauding people in the country he feels gratitude toward for his stay.

The man said he found the job information in a Facebook post, which offered a salary of about 250,000 Sri Lankan rupees ($855). He was given a list of telephone numbers in Japan to call from a room in the building where the company’s office is located.

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He was instructed to make investment sales pitches in Japanese by phone, using an app to conceal the origin of the call from Sri Lanka.

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