Technology

When you’re unemployed, the promise of a job can feel like a lifeline. For a young man, identified only by his first name Pierre, the offer he came across one night on Facebook seemed too good to be true. A call centre in Thailand was recruiting young, English-speaking South Africans with a valid passport, no qualifications needed, with the chance of earning thousands of dollars a month, with flights and accommodation included. He’d heard of people going to teach English in China for a year or two; he even had a friend who had relocated to Saudi Arabia and seemed to be earning well.

It only took 10 days for his plane ticket to arrive. When he arrived in Thailand, he was met by a representative of what looked like a legitimate transfer company. Within eight hours, he had been transferred into four different vehicles, eventually arriving at the Moei River on the border of Myanmar and Thailand, where he boarded a barge and was taken across to a walled compound. Once inside, his passport and phone were taken. Pierre had arrived at the call centre; it just wasn’t the kind he’d envisioned.