Inside the dark world of Philippine scam centres
Then came explosive allegations that the local mayor was involved in the illicit operation -- and that she was a Chinese national masquerading as a Filipina.
The scandal stunned the nation and fuelled calls for the government to ban the online gambling industry over its links to financial scams, kidnapping, prostitution, human trafficking, torture and murder.
President Ferdinand Marcos outlawed the sector this week, saying "the grave abuse and disrespect to our system of laws must stop", and foreign workers involved have been given two months to leave the Philippines.
Authorities believe there could be several hundred illegal online gambling entities -- as well as a good number of the more than 40 licenced operators -- that are running scam centres under the noses of public officials.
Alice Leal Guo, the mayor of Bamban, where the raided scam centre was metres from the municipal hall, has been accused of human trafficking and money laundering in relation to the operation.
Guo has been suspended from her job and is in hiding after a warrant was issued for her arrest. She has denied the allegations against her.
"It seems Alice Guo is only the tip of an iceberg," Senator Risa Hontiveros told a Senate committee investigating the online gambling industry.
"This committee hearing is in the process of uncovering a deep and deadly web of bad actors involving international criminal syndicates, local and national politicians, and perhaps malevolent elements of a foreign state."
The sprawling Bamban complex, which was operated by Chinese nationals and included office buildings, luxury villas and a large swimming pool, was raided in March after a Vietnamese worker escaped and called police.
More than 700 Filipinos, Chinese, Vietnamese, Malaysians, Taiwanese, Indonesians and Rwandans were found on site, along with documents allegedly showing that Guo was president of a company that owned the compound.
"She really needs to answer for this in jail," said Winston Casio, spokesman for the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC).
'Heads need to roll'
Scam centres have mushroomed across Southeast Asia, with crime syndicates luring, kidnapping or coercing workers into predatory online activity, and raking in billions of dollars.
Victims have reported travelling across the region, often on the pretence of romance or high-paying jobs but finding themselves forced instead to cajole people into ploughing money into fake investment platforms and other ruses.
In the Philippines, scam centres are often disguised as online gambling operations, which are mostly run by Chinese nationals and target people overseas.
Official figures show more than 60,000 foreigners and Filipinos are working for licenced online gambling companies. Casio estimates as many as 100,000 could be employed by the illegal ones.
They flourished under former president Rodrigo Duterte after the government regulator was given the right to issue operating licences nationwide.
Many lost their licences in 2023 and went underground. Authorities are now racing to shut them all down.
Five have been raided since last year, with several thousand foreigners repatriated, expelled or charged, Casio told AFP at his office inside one of the scam centres targeted.
Casio said "heads need to roll" among public officials, including mayors and police chiefs, who have allowed the scam centres to operate in plain sight.
"If we don't start bringing people to court, if we don't start asking these people to spend time in jail, then we won't put an end to this problem," Casio said.
'I don't want to scam'
Inside the Bamban compound, victims engaged in online scams under threat of physical harm or other punishment.
Dylan, a Malaysian national in his 20s, worked there for a month after a friend tricked him into visiting the complex.
Once inside, Dylan said he wasn't allowed to leave. He suspects that his friend sold him to the Chinese bosses in exchange for his own freedom.
Dylan, who used a pseudonym for the interview with AFP because he is a state witness, said he was forced to use Chinese matchmaking sites to contact parents looking for a husband for their daughter.
After he was introduced to the woman, he would try to convince her to invest in a fake Chinese oil company in Dubai.
Scammers were expected to meet a monthly target of 300,000 yuan ($41,200) or risk being tortured, he said.
They received a 10 percent commission but no salary and had to work at least 12 hours a day, seven days a week.
Dylan said he was beaten once and feared for his life.
"I don't want to scam, I just want to survive, just do my job every day," Dylan told AFP at the PAOCC office where he is being held.
- 'A fake Filipino' -
Guo's nationality has been a key focus of the Senate probe, which comes as relations between Manila and Beijing worsen over disputes in the South China Sea.
The National Bureau of Investigation told the inquiry that Guo's fingerprints matched those of a Chinese national who had been given a special investor resident visa along with her Chinese mother.
"This confirms what I have suspected all along. Mayor Alice is a fake Filipino," Hontiveros said in a statement.
"She is a Chinese national masquerading as Filipino citizen to facilitate crimes being committed by POGO (online gambling operation)."
Authorities have frozen assets belonging to Guo and others linked to the scam centre, including 90 bank accounts, properties, luxury vehicles and a helicopter.
Casio fears Guo may try to evade arrest by changing her appearance at one of the clandestine hospitals set up by scam centres to treat their workers.
A recent raid on an illegal medical facility found equipment used for cosmetic surgery.
"You could basically get in there as one person and get out a totally whole new person," Casio said.
"That's how sophisticated the operation was."