TOKYO, March 16 – About 10 men from Japan’s Fukuoka prefecture have gone missing after traveling to Cambodia, and police suspect some may have been drawn into telecom fraud groups operating in Southeast Asia, Japanese media reported.
Fukuoka Prefectural Police have been investigating cases involving men, mainly in their 20s and 30s, who traveled to Cambodia from 2024, the Mainichi newspaper reported on Monday.
A woman in her 50s told the newspaper she lost contact with her university-age son after he left home in December, saying he was taking a short trip with a friend. She said his smartphone location first showed him in another East Asian country before shifting to Cambodia the next day.
When she messaged him to seek help if anything went wrong, he replied it was “a normal trip,” according to the report. His phone later appeared to be switched off and his location sharing stopped, the newspaper said.
She filed a missing-person report after he failed to return as scheduled and contacted Japan’s foreign ministry and its embassy in Cambodia, the report said. His whereabouts remain unknown.
The woman later learned her son had traveled with a co-worker who had told others he was invited overseas by someone he met on social media, with travel costs covered and local transport and interpretation arranged, according to the report. The friend is also missing.
Police told the mother her son and his friend may have been caught up in a special fraud ring, Mainichi said.
Japanese police believe criminal groups have shifted some scam operations to Southeast Asia, including Cambodia, to evade domestic enforcement, recruiting Japanese nationals to place fraudulent calls back to Japan, the newspaper said.
One missing man had told others he was leaving for a telemarketing job paying 300,000 yen ($2,000) a month, but has been unaccounted for for more than a year, according to the report.
