Former Pogo workers set up own firms for online scams

PHONE STORAGE Photo shows mobile phones found during a raid on an online scam office near the Senate in Pasay City on Thursday. —PHOTO FROM PAOCC

Enterprising Filipinos who formerly worked for Philippine offshore gaming operators (Pogos) have set up their own companies involved in online fraud and other scamming activities, according to Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian.

In a radio interview on Saturday, Gatchalian said individuals who previously managed big Pogo hubs had supposedly established smaller companies to avoid getting the attention of law enforcement agencies.

He said some of these facilities employed about 200 workers and operated from ordinary commercial spaces, such as the one that authorities raided in Pasay City on Thursday.

The raid on 3D Analyzer Information Technologies Inc., whose office was located just several meters away from the Senate building, also showed that some Filipinos had apparently become Pogo operators.

“I fear that some of our own countrymen, who saw that scamming is very profitable, are now doing the scamming activities themselves,” Gatchalian told the “Usapang Senado” program over radio dwIZ.

“This is ‘technology transfer’ in an evil way. A criminal activity has been ‘transferred’ to the locals,” he added.

Pogos, which flourished during the Duterte administration, were commonly owned and operated by Chinese nationals.

In the case of 3D Analyzer, Gatchalian noted that almost one-third of its nearly 300 employees were Filipinos.

The senator said the departure from the country of their Chinese employers supposedly gave the former Pogo workers an opportunity to start their own operations.

Since they were better in using the English language than their Chinese bosses, he said the Filipino Pogo operators were also better in looking for potential victims.

“From what I heard, the profits from the operations of these smaller Pogos were even bigger because they practically don’t have huge investments,” he said.

He said the groups have their own Filipino “leader” and “organizer” who allegedly recruit 20 to 40 individuals in carrying out their modus.

“We’re already looking into this and when the time comes, we will invite these leaders [to the Senate hearing],” Gatchalian said. INQ