PHNOM PENH, July 15 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia deported more than 16,000 foreign online scam suspects in the first half of 2026 as crackdowns on cybercrime remained ongoing, a senior immigration official has said.
Police Lieutenant General Sok Veasna, director general of the General Department of Immigration, said that enforcement operations against online fraud have ramped up significantly since January.
"During the first six months of this year, we deported over 45,000 foreigners, including more than 16,000 online scam suspects," he said during a mid-year review meeting on Tuesday.
According to Veasna, all deported individuals are prohibited from re-entering Cambodia permanently.
Thong Mengdavid, deputy director at the China-ASEAN Studies Center of the Cambodia University of Technology and Science, said the mass deportation of suspected foreign scammers is a welcome, long-overdue step to salvage Cambodia's reputation and disrupt massive cyber-scam networks; however, it is only a temporary fix.
To truly win this fight, Cambodia must target the high-level kingpins and dismantle the local protection networks that allow these operations to thrive, he told Xinhua on Wednesday. Until the underlying human trafficking and corruption are addressed, the root of the problem remains, he added.
The Southeast Asian country has launched an unprecedented nationwide crackdown on cyber scam networks to maintain public safety and restore the kingdom's international image.
In April, the kingdom promulgated the Law on Combating Online Scams, which stipulates harsh punishments for online bosses and ringleaders. ■