The FBI’s global crackdown on overseas scam centers targeting Americans has led to more than 130 arrests or detentions in Ghana, with investigators identifying nearly $10 million in financial losses, Fox News Digital has learned.
The latest takedown is part of Operation Blackout, the FBI’s international campaign to dismantle scam compounds that prey on Americans, particularly seniors.
According to information provided to Fox News Digital by the FBI, investigators have identified 89 fraud victims and seized more than 300 devices. The more than 130 individuals arrested or detained include suspected trafficking victims expected to be repatriated to their home countries, primarily Nigeria.
FBI Director Kash Patel said the operation reflects the bureau’s broader effort to dismantle international fraud networks at their source.
“The FBI’s ‘Operation Blackout’ is our historic, global scam center fraud demolition operation that takes apart scam compounds all over the world targeting American citizens – primarily seniors,” Patel said.
“We are attacking this problem right at the source and blowing these compounds up, seizing billions of dollars, freeing thousands of trafficked workers, and protecting tens of thousands of Americans at risk of looking their hard-earned savings through these scams. Those who steal from Americans no longer have sanctuary – this FBI will find them and bring them to justice.”
The Ghana operation follows an earlier warning from Patel that international scam networks were expanding beyond Southeast Asia and the Middle East into Africa.
“That’s why you’re seeing the migration of these scam compounds to central and sub-Saharan Africa, which is where we are already pre-positioned to take them off,” Patel told Fox News Digital in September.
That same month, U.S. investigators helped authorities in Madagascar dismantle 13 scam centers linked to Chinese organized crime syndicates, processing more than 3,200 electronic devices, according to previous Fox News Digital reporting.
