Kash Patel Says US Dismantled 20 Scam Compounds In Global Crackdown

WASHINGTON, DC-FBI Director Kash Patel said the bureau and its partners had seized more than $17 billion from overseas scam compounds under Operation Blackout, as the Trump administration launched a government-wide crackdown on call centers and online networks that defraud Americans.

Speaking at a White House roundtable on cybercrime and scams chaired by President Donald Trump on October 21, Patel said the operation had “destroyed and demolished over 20 compounds” run by criminal syndicates.

Patel said the scam centers operated across several regions, including Southeast Asia, Africa and the Middle East. He said US authorities had recently arrested 300 people in Ghana and Nigeria and seized another $15 million linked to scams targeting older Americans.

“Just two weeks ago, we were in Ghana, Nigeria, and we arrested another 300 individuals and seized another $15 million being fleeced from American senior citizens through these scam center operations,” Patel said.

Attorney General Todd Blanche said the FBI and Dubai Police had announced in April the arrests of at least 276 people and the dismantling of at least nine scam centers targeting Americans. Prosecutors had also unsealed charges against the centers’ managers and recruiters.

Blanche said the State Department was denying entry to scam operators, while the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations identified suspects and prosecutors pursued charges.

“There is no corner of government from which these predators can hide,” Blanche said.

He said the Justice Department had established a new scam center unit with the Homeland Security Task Force to build cases against entire criminal networks rather than individual scammers. Its cyber-enabled scam initiative deploys dozens of prosecutors across all 94 US attorneys’ offices, he added.

Patel said technology companies, including Meta, Google, Microsoft and IBM, had helped shut down internet trafficking and domain networks. He urged victims to report scams to the FBI, stressing that even small pieces of information could help investigations.

“We are not waiting for the scammers to hit our citizens. We are going out there in full force,” Patel said. (IANS)