Police raids uncover SIM box devices behind land tax scam by Taiwanese gang
Young Thai woman arrested for renting house to facilitate call centre scam
Police raided two locations in Bangkok and Samut Prakan yesterday, October 7, to seize SIM box devices used by a call centre scam gang led by Taiwanese nationals. A Thai woman was arrested after the raids as her name appeared on one of the rental accommodation contracts.
Officers from the Investigation Division of the Metropolitan Police Bureau (IDMB) launched the operation after a victim lost 398,900 baht in a fake land tax scam. The gang contacted the victim on September 15 and tricked them into installing a fraudulent mobile application to pay the supposed land tax.
Investigators discovered that the scammers were using SIM boxes, or GSM gateway devices, to disguise international scam calls as domestic ones.
Further inquiries revealed that the gang had rented three properties to install the SIM box devices, allowing members based overseas to make scam calls to victims in Thailand. This intelligence led to the two raids carried out yesterday.
At the first location, a two-storey townhouse in the Ram Inthra area of Bangkok, officers found a 16-slot SIM box device, an internet router, a CCTV camera, an uninterruptible power supply (UPS), and two LAN cables. Records indicated that more than 9,000 scam calls had been made from this site.
Officers then continued the operation at the second location, a condominium in the Bang Phli district of Samut Prakan province, where they confiscated similar equipment, including another 16-slot SIM box, router, CCTV camera, UPS, and LAN cables.
The condominium was reportedly rented by a Taiwanese national, while the townhouse was leased under the name of a 20 year old Thai woman identified as Arisara. Officers later coordinated with local police in Nakhon Sawan province to arrest Arisara at her dormitory.
Arisara claimed that a Taiwanese man had hired her about a month earlier to rent the house for 6,000 baht per month. She said she was paid 3,500 baht for her help but insisted she had no knowledge of the property’s illegal use.
Police are continuing their investigation and working to identify other suspects involved in the scam operation.
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