State Department imposes visa restrictions on foreign cyber scammers

The State Department on Thursday announced new visa restrictions for individuals linked to foreign cybercrime networks and their immediate family members. 

Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s statement on the policy came on his final day of a trip to the Philippines for general meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). The region is known as a hotbed for industrial-scale scam centers.

FBI Director Kash Patel met separately this week with leaders in the region to discuss combatting those operations. Rubio also discussed scam centers with the Cambodia’s foreign minister on Thursday, the State Department said.

The new visa restrictions target individuals “responsible for, or complicit in, cybercrime and cyber-enabled crime, such as those involved in cyberscams, and sextortion,” Rubio said Thursday.  

The policy change follows President Donald Trump’s March executive order on fighting cybercrime, fraud and predatory schemes.

Rubio noted that “Chinese transnational criminal groups” are often behind the scam operations, which include human trafficking and money laundering. The U.S. government estimates they cost Americans $10 billion alone in 2024.

A report published this week by the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime said the region’s syndicates have only grown more sophisticated and interconnected in recent years, “integrating drug production and distribution, cyber-enabled fraud, trafficking in persons, underground banking, and real estate investment within shared operational and financial infrastructure.” 

Rubio said that by “restricting visa issuance to those who are responsible for or complicit in these criminal enterprises, we are sending a clear message: The United States will go after those who prey on our citizens.”

Visa restrictions are not a new tactic for the State Department.

In February 2024, the agency announced visa restrictions for people “involved in the misuse of commercial spyware,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at the time. That policy also targeted immediate family members of bad actors.