Sri Lanka arrests nine Chinese over alleged cyberscam gear

Nine Chinese nationals were arrested at Sri Lanka’s main international airport on Thursday while attempting to smuggle in communication equipment allegedly intended for cyberscam operations, customs authorities said.

A laptop. Photo: Rachel Johnson, via Flickr.

The arrests come two weeks after police detained 152 foreign nationals, mostly Chinese, for allegedly running a cyberscam operation out of a hotel in the island’s northwest.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun told AFP in Beijing on Thursday that they were willing to “cooperate to jointly combat criminal activities, including online fraud”.

In the latest incident, Sri Lankan officers recovered 383 used mobile phones, 101 tablet computers, six Wi-Fi routers and GPS trackers from nine arriving Chinese nationals, a customs spokesman said.

“The equipment was taped to the bodies of the suspects,” the spokesman added, noting the haul was valued at 24 million rupees ($78,000) and was confiscated.

Separately, another six Chinese passengers were arrested Thursday while allegedly trying to smuggle in 75,900 cigarettes packed into their luggage, officials said.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun at a press conference on April 21, 2025. Photo: China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The cigarettes, valued at 11.3 million rupees ($37,000), were confiscated.

Organised criminal gangs have used casinos, hotels and fortified compounds across Southeast Asia as bases to carry out sophisticated online scams, defrauding people through cryptocurrency investment schemes and fake romantic relationships, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.

Until a crackdown this year, the region was the epicentre of the multibillion-dollar online scam industry, in which hundreds of thousands of fraudsters — some trafficked, others willing workers — cheat internet users globally.

“Due to Sri Lanka’s well-developed telecommunications infrastructure, favourable geographical location and relatively lenient visa policies, some telecom fraud gangs have moved to Sri Lanka,” the Chinese embassy in Colombo said recently.

“That is why such cases have been increasing in Sri Lanka recently,” it added, noting that the scammers had been targeting Chinese nationals at home.