Thailand has frozen 678 bank accounts in six days as part of an action against scammers through its Anti-Online Scam Operation Centre (AOC), launched recently by the Thailand Ministry of Digital Economy and Society (MDES).
MDES minister Prasert Chantararuangthong said the AOC is a one-stop service in collaboration with the Bank of Thailand, the Royal Thai Police, the Anti-Money Laundering Office, and the National Broadcasting and Telecommunication Commission to aid scam victims by "immediate" suspension of fraudulent bank accounts upon receiving complaints.
The procedures also include following up on investigations, accelerating the process of money recovery and using technology to combat scams.
Prasert said the AOC will monitor fraud cases and provide consultation to the public in the event of an online scam.
It will leverage an artificial intelligence-based platform to gather information and create a large database for use in preventing and cracking scams, he added.
The AOC intends to analyse call history and phone numbers, as well as financial information regarding suspected transactions and forward those details to related banks to freeze the scammer's accounts in time.
As per the ministry, there were over 330,000 cybercrime cases reported from 1 March 2022 to Sept 30 this year, causing damage worth over 45 billion baht (US$1.26 million).
Prasert expects the AOC will effectively reduce the number of online scams within a month.
As part of the AOC’s ongoing mission, Prasert said the centre is working with Facebook to take down 700 Facebook scam pages per day.
Thailand's Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has also set up an "Investment Fraud Report Hotline" for citizens, investors, and various organisations to jointly report information about investment scams in the capital market.
It is collaborating with Meta, Thailand and LINE to block the channels of fraudsters active on their platforms.
