The number of foreigners arrested for illegal money collecting or other scams has surged from 87 in 2023 to 753 last year and 1,066 so far this year, National Police Agency (NPA) data released yesterday showed.
It and the National Immigration Agency (NIA) said they would work closer to combat the rise in foreigners working as money collectors, or running scams or other criminal operations.
The NPA said in a statement that many of those arrested for collecting cash from ATMs to pass over to handlers from criminal organizations were from Southeast Asian countries and had entered the country on short-term tourist visas, 30-day visa-free stays or were migrant workers who were already in Taiwan.
Photo courtesy of the Kinmen County Police Bureau
Officials told a news conference in Changhua County that they had arrested a Vietnamese man after he allegedly collected NT$170,000 in cash from ATMs to pass on to handlers.
The man said he obtained the job after responding to advertisements on social media that promised NT$3,000 to NT$5,000 per day.
If convicted, he could face one to 12 years in prison, a fine and would be deported after serving his sentence, Changhua County Police Chief Chen Ming-chun (陳明君) said.
Chen said that in the first five months of this year, the county had arrested 107 foreign nationals for suspected involvement in money collecting, 65 of whom are Vietnamese, 22 from Malaysia, 14 from Singapore, four from the Philippines and two from Thailand.
Thirty-four of them came to Taiwan visa-free, 44 are migrant workers with employment contracts, 25 are migrant workers who absconded from their employers, two are on student visas and two are on business visas, Chen said.
NPA officials said they are working with the consulate offices of some of the countries of those arrested to develop public education campaigns to warn of the legal consequences for working as money collectors for criminal organizations.
They want to showcase actual cases to warn people not to trust social media advertisements promising “easy money” by traveling to Taiwan, with food and accommodation paid for, to act as a money collector, the officials said.
The NPA said it would work with counterparts in the countries to share information on scam operators and criminal organizations, while providing anti-fraud material in the native languages of the nations to warn of the scams and to report suspected criminal activity.
NIA officials said they would establish files on “high-risk subjects” to filter out foreign nationals who are entering Taiwan often on visa-free tourist stays, but could be working in illegal money collecting.
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