On October 14, 2025, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) joined with the U.K.’s Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office (“FCDO”) to impose sanctions aimed at disrupting a network that operates illegal scam centers across Southeast Asia. Both OFAC and the FCDO designated the Prince Group, a Cambodia-based network that operates a transnational criminal organization (“TCO”), its leader Chen Zhi, and his associates. According to U.S. and U.K. authorities, the Prince Group runs online investment scams that target individuals in the United States, the United Kingdom and other allied nations, usually involving scammers who defraud victims by convincing them to “invest” increasingly large amounts of money into fraudulent cryptocurrency schemes. The scammers, who are often trafficked foreign nationals forced to work under the threat of torture, also allegedly launder the funds that are stolen from their victims.
According to OFAC, these online investment scams, which have increased over the last several years, are responsible for more than $16.6 billion in U.S. losses, including at least $10 billion in losses in 2024 alone. Because of this, OFAC designated 146 individuals and entities associated with the Prince Group and Zhi. Other entities sanctioned by both OFAC and the FCDO include the Jin Bai Group, a leisure and entertainment business linked to the Prince Group, and the Golden Fortune Resorts World Ltd., a “scam compound” built by a Prince Group subsidiary that is disguised as a “technology park.” OFAC reported that locals have told journalists that they witnessed workers who attempted to escape from the Golden Fortune being beaten until they were barely alive after they were forced to return to the resort. The OFAC designations were imposed pursuant to Executive Order 13851, as amended, for being a foreign person that constitutes a significant TCO or has acted on behalf of the Prince Group or its affiliates. A list of OFAC designees is also included in Annex I to OFAC’s press release.
The FCDO designations were imposed pursuant to the Global Human Rights Sanctions Regulations 2020 (SI 2020/680), which subjects listed individuals and entities to assets freezes. As part of the FCDO’s crackdown, a £12 million mansion in North London that is reportedly owned by a multi-national network that used forced labor to conduct online scams, was frozen. U.K. authorities also reported that it froze a £100 million office building in the City of London and seventeen flats in South London that were linked of Chen Zhi and his “web of enablers.”
OFAC also reported that FinCEN issued a final rule under section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act in order to sever the Huione Group, a Cambodia-based financial services conglomerate, from the U.S. financial system. According to FinCEN, the Huione Group has not only laundered the proceeds of online investment scams associated with the Prince Group, but also laundered the proceeds of cyber heists carried out by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The final rule effectively prohibits covered financial institutions from opening or maintaining correspondent accounts for or on behalf of the Huione Group. Covered financial institutions are also required to take reasonable steps not to process correspondent account transactions for foreign banking institutions in the United States that might involve the Huione Group.
On the same day, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York unsealed an indictment charging Chen Zhi with wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy in connection with his operation of forced-labor scam compounds across Cambodia. The DOJ reports that this action, which involves the forfeiture of approximately $15 billion in Bitcoin, is the largest in the Department’s history.
U.S. Department of Treasury – OFAC Press Release | OFAC Chart – Prince Group TCO | U.S. Department of Treasury – FinCEN Press Release | USAO EDNY Press Release | U.K. Government Press Release | U.K. OFSI Financial Sanctions Notice