The US State Department has kept Cambodia at the lowest Tier 3 trafficking ranking in its 2026 Trafficking in Persons Report, citing alleged complicity by senior officials in trafficking linked to online scam centers, inadequate victim protection and a failure to prosecute scam center operators for trafficking offences.
In a section detailing its latest review of Cambodia’s scam center and trafficking enforcement, the State Department said Cambodia does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so.
Of particular concern, it points to a “government pattern of human trafficking involving scam centers,” claiming some senior government officials, advisors and law enforcement officers financially benefited from the trafficking of victims in scam centers and interfered to protect scam center operations and intimidate victims and civil society.
This is despite Prime Minister Hun Manet having initiated a nationwide scam crackdown last year, with increased law enforcement activity against scam centers through raids and arrests, including those of some high-profile Cambodian and foreign transnational criminal organization (TCO) leaders.
The report alleges that Cambodia has enforced laws selectively and has rarely held high-level perpetrators or complicit officials criminally accountable.
“The government did not prosecute any traffickers related to scam center activity, and detained tens of thousands of former scam workers in immigration detention facilities, reportedly with minimal or no screening to determine their potential status as trafficking victims or to refer them to adequate services,” the report states.
“The government also prevented civil society organizations from screening or providing victim services to foreign national potential victims in immigration detention facilities, or from providing shelter services without prior government approval, which was rarely granted.
“Victim services were inadequate to handle the significant increase in potential victims fleeing scam centers, and authorities reportedly inappropriately penalized victims solely for unlawful acts, particularly immigration violations, committed as a direct result of being trafficked. The government reported identifying fewer trafficking victims than in the previous reporting period.”
On Cambodia’s law enforcement efforts, the State Department noted that the 2008 Law on the Suppression of Human Trafficking and Commercial Sexual Exploitation criminalized sex trafficking and labor trafficking and prescribed penalties of seven to 15 years’ imprisonment for offences involving an adult victim and 15 to 20 years’ imprisonment for those involving a child victim.
While these penalties are sufficiently stringent, sex trafficking crimes have often been prosecuted under lesser statutes, incurring lower penalties. The report said NGOs had reported that, in practice, the government did not impose criminal penalties under the anti-trafficking law on labor traffickers and instead used the labor law to issue fines or short jail sentences of six days to one month. These penalties did not represent sufficient punishment to deter future crimes or provide justice for victims.
Nationwide, the State Department said law enforcement authorities had often failed to effectively investigate or prosecute suspected traffickers despite credible allegations, citing resource constraints and official complicity.
“Institutionalized corruption and official complicity in labor trafficking and forced criminality persisted,” the report claims.
“Senior government officials, family members of senior officials and business elites with close relationships with senior officials, including two senators sanctioned by the United States, reportedly were involved with and benefited from scam centers or owned properties on which scam centers operated.
“Involvement of such officials and elites resulted in selective enforcement of laws, which inhibited effective law enforcement action. Observers reported scam centers often received advance warning of impending law enforcement actions, were not investigated, or required local law enforcement to receive permission from senior government officials to enter, giving compound operators time to adjust operations and move victims.”
The State Department report did acknowledge the successful arrest and deportation of the head of casino operator Prince Group. This was followed by raids initially targeting scam centers tied to Prince Group and later expanded to include other scam centers and smaller buildings where suspected scammers had relocated their operations.
These campaigns, it observed, resulted in the closure of hundreds of suspected scam centers and the release of thousands of potential trafficking victims.
However, the report also alleges that local residents and survivors who fled compounds during these crackdowns reported that the compounds had started emptying before police or military personnel arrived, while other nearby scam centers remained in operation.
“Observers critiqued the government for taking only limited steps to effectively disrupt or shut down such operations and noted that some scam centers tied to powerful elites were not targeted for raids,” it said. “In January 2026, the government issued official licenses to casinos with a documented history of hosting scam centers.”
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