US DOJ strike force seizes $580M in crypto from pig butchering scams

The US Department of Justice’s Scam Center Strike Force has recovered $580 million in digital assets connected to pig butchering scams run by Chinese transnational criminal organizations, according to a Friday announcement.

Established last November, the strike force focuses on scam compounds mainly located in Southeast Asia to dismantle the global infrastructure behind pig butchering and crypto investment fraud.

Attorney Jeanine Pirro, who heads federal prosecutions in the nation’s capital, said the milestone was reached within three months of the task force’s formation.

“These criminals don’t care who you are, what you believe in, or what you ate for breakfast—all they want is to steal from good and honest Americans to line the pockets of Chinese organized crime,” Pirro said.

Pig butchering is a sophisticated romance-investment fraud where scammers use emotional intimacy to lower a victim’s defenses before steering them toward counterfeit trading platforms.

Scam operators, many based in compounds across Burma, Cambodia, and Laos, use American social media networks and text messages to identify targets.

In some Southeast Asian nations, revenue from fraud operations approaches half of gross domestic product, according to the Justice Department.

The task force brings together prosecutors from the DOJ’s Criminal Division, the FBI, the Secret Service, and the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigation unit.

By January 2026, the initiative had already recovered $402 million in digital assets linked to scam networks.