Provision of internet access to scam centres being investigated as Starlink swiftly becomes Myanmar’s biggest internet service provider

A powerful bipartisan committee in the US Congress says it has begun an investigation into the involvement of Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite business in providing internet access to Myanmar scam centres, blamed for swindling billions from victims across the world.

The move comes as it was revealed that large numbers of Starlink dishes began appearing on scam-centre roofs in Myanmar around the time of a crackdown in February that was supposed to eradicate the centres, according to a investigation by Agence France-Presse

Starlink has come from nowhere to become the war-torn country’s biggest internet provider in three months, data from the APNIC Asian regional internet registry shows.

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SpaceX, Starlink’s owner, has not replied to AFP requests for comment.

The US Congress joint economic committee told the news agency it began an investigation in July into Starlink’s involvement with the scam centres. The committee has the power to make Musk testify before it.

China, Thailand and Myanmar forced pro-junta Myanmar militias who protect the centres into promising to “eradicate” the compounds in February. They freed about 7,000 people – most Chinese citizens – from the brutal call centre-style system, which the UN says runs on forced labour and human trafficking.

Many workers said they were beaten and forced to work long hours by scam bosses who target victims across the globe with telephone, internet and social media cons.

Senator Maggie Hassan, the leading Democrat on the US congressional committee, has called on Musk to block the Starlink service to the fraud factories.

“While most people have probably noticed the increasing number of scam texts, calls and emails, they may not know that transnational criminals halfway across the world may be perpetrating these scams by using Starlink internet access,” she said.

The senator wrote to Musk in July demanding answers to 11 questions about Starlink’s role.

Former California prosecutor Erin West, who now heads the Operation Shamrock group campaigning against the centres, said: “It is abhorrent that an American company is enabling this to happen.”

While still a cybercrime prosecutor, she warned Starlink in July 2024 that the mostly Chinese crime syndicates that run the centres were using its technology, but received no reply.

Americans are among the top targets of south-east Asia scammers, the US treasury department said, losing an estimated $10bn last year, up 66% in 12 months.

Up to 120,000 people may be being “forced to carry out online scams” in the Myanmar centres, according to a UN report in 2023.

On the Thailand-Myanmar border, new buildings have been springing up inside the heavily guarded compounds around Myawaddy at a fast pace, with some festooned with Starlink receivers, satellite images and AFP drone footage show.

Analysis of satellite images from Planet Labs PBC found dozens of buildings going up or being altered in the largest of the compounds, KK Park, between March and September.