Latest news with #Wan
Business Insider
14 hours ago
- Business
- Business Insider
AI is helping small businesses increase productivity. Here's a look inside the computing hardware helping power it.
Businesses across industries are increasing their AI usage. AI workloads require hardware equipped with powerful processors that can handle these tasks. Responsible and sustainable AI adoption is key to business success. Most tech-savvy observers understand that AI is transforming large enterprises across functions such as customer service, HR, and the supply chain. Chatbots and virtual assistants are now powered by large language models (LLMs) that respond to nearly any natural-language query. These models are trained on business-specific data to provide targeted, accurate answers. According to a poll from the US Chamber of Commerce and Teneo, 98% of small businesses now use AI-enabled software, and 40 % of them employ generative tools like chatbots and image creators to cut costs and speed workflows. But AI isn't just making a splash at big corporations: a new generation of everyday business hardware and operating systems is putting AI in the hands of business owners of all sizes, with applications across a wide range of business functions. Business computing systems for the AI era Andrew Wan, product manager at MSI, has a front-row seat to the transformative impact of AI across industries. He explains that what was once a buzzword is now a practical, everyday tool. In fact, 91% of SMBs that have adopted AI say it's driven measurable revenue growth, according to a survey of 3,350 business leaders from Salesforce. For example, in marketing, AI is powering smarter, more personalized campaigns. Content teams are creating, tweaking, and repurposing material at incredible speeds. Meanwhile, in law, AI is cutting down the time needed for research and contract reviews. The classroom and the clinic are also seeing significant benefits. In education, AI is making learning more flexible, while In healthcare, AI is improving diagnoses and patient care. Across fields, AI boosts productivity and enables people to focus on the work that really matters. AI-ready computing hardware Many business owners have questions about the suitability of their legacy systems in this new AI era. According to Wan, MSI's latest technology is designed to help everyday business users take full advantage of AI. The Cubi NUC AI+ 2M, for example, include the next-generation Intel® Lunar Lake processors, featuring on-chip NPU and GPU cores which provide efficient, on-device AI computing. These compact systems also include Microsoft Copilot+, an AI-powered assistant designed to help teams work smarter. And it's not just enthusiasts leveraging AI: 27% of SMBs have "significantly accelerated" tech spending because of AI needs, with another 35% "slightly accelerating" their investments — underscoring why on-device NPUs and GPUs are so critical. MSI's new desktop models also come with Windows 11 Pro pre-installed, offering businesses a smoother upgrade path from Windows 10 as Microsoft's October migration deadline looms. A real business impact AI is already improving productivity and business outcomes at many organizations. Early adopters in small and mid-sized businesses are seeing real gains by automating repetitive workflows that free up valuable time and resources. "We're hearing about tangible improvements in productivity, customer satisfaction, and even employee engagement as teams are empowered by technology that supports their goals," Wan said. Although AI has already had a profound impact on businesses, Wan believes we've only scratched the surface of its potential. Over the next year, he expects AI to become even more embedded in everyday workflows, especially through smart devices that offer real-time insights while keeping data private and secure. "Fast forward five years, and AI won't just be a helpful tool — it'll be at the heart of how businesses run," he said. "It'll shape strategies, spark new revenue ideas, and open doors to ways of working we haven't even imagined yet. The companies that start laying the groundwork now with AI-friendly systems will be the ones setting the pace in this smarter, more connected future." AI for good Of course, for all of the opportunities AI affords businesses, there are also a number of risks to watch out for. Wan says MSI is committed to responsible adoption of AI, and its suite of AI-powered computing products have been designed with sustainability in mind. "We've built in a three-year Advance Replacement Warranty, which means virtually zero downtime," Wan said. "And by focusing on energy-efficient design, we're helping businesses reduce their environmental footprint while embracing the future of work." 77% of small businesses plan to adopt new digital technologies — including AI and even metaverse tools — within the next year, making energy-efficient hardware and robust warranties like MSI's Advance Replacement critical for minimizing both downtime and environmental impact. "As we build toward a more intelligent future, we believe it's just as important to build a more sustainable one," Wan said.
Perth Now
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
M3GAN director James Wan says spin-off SOULM8TE is like ‘Fatal Attraction but with robots'
James Wan has teased SOULM8TE will be like 'Fatal Attraction but with robots'. The 48-year-old director is producing the upcoming M3GAN spin-off, and has now revealed SOULM8TE 'embraces all the great erotic thrillers from the '90s'. Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Wan said: 'SOULM8TE is basically set in the same AI world but seen through a more grown-up perspective, one that embraces all the great erotic thrillers from the '90s. It's like Fatal Attraction but with robots.' The Conjuring filmmaker - who also wrote the story for SOULM8TE alongside Ingrid Bisu and Rafael Jordan - added the flick still has 'that darkest sense of humour' from M3GAN and its sequel M3GAN 2.0, 'but it's really more grown-up'. He explained: 'It is hard to replicate that sassiness that M3GAN has, and we don't really want to do the same thing that we've done because M3GAN has fully stuck a claim to that style of humor, if you will.' He added: 'M3GAN, obviously, dabbles in the PG-13 world, the younger demographic. We always felt like there might be a more adult story to tell, and that's really what SOULM8TE is.' In SOULM8TE, David Rysdahl stars as a grieving widower who turns to an AI android (Lily Sullivan) for comfort. However, his quest to create a sentient companion takes a dark turn when the love-bot evolves into a lethal soulmate. Allison Williams - who stars as Gemma in the M3GAN films and serves as executive producer on SOULM8TE - explained the concept of a love-bot mirrors the dark truth of reality. She said: 'It's already happening in parts of the world. These exist. 'So it felt irresistible to then say, if a M3GAN existed in our world, someone would take that tech and put it in the form of a female-bodied person whose sole purpose on the planet is to pleasure a person. We extrapolate from there.' Williams stressed SOULM8TE - which has completed principal photography in New Zealand and is due to hit screens in January 2026 - would be separate to the M3GAN films despite being part of the same cinematic universe. She said: 'Here's how I would describe it: Everyone has already pictured it. 'When the first movie came out, we knew everyone was going to be imagining this, so we were like, 'Don't do that to our girl.' 'We will give you a different person and a different story and an R-rated world to do this in. Let M3GAN be M3GAN, and leave her out of this completely.' The next instalment of the horror series, M3GAN 2.0, releases on Friday (27.06.25), and will follow the titular robot after she is rebuilt by her creator Gemma (Williams) to battle the self-aware military android AMELIA, who is intent on an AI takeover (Ivanna Sakhno). Looking to the future, Wan said the team is yet to seriously think about making a team-up movie with M3GAN, SOULM8TE and AMELIA, though were open to the idea. He said: 'The Avengers of the M3GAN universe? I haven't really thought about that, I got to be honest. 'We have joked about it, but we are not quite sure whether in that version, are they the villains or are they the good guys? We haven't crossed that path.'
Time of India
3 days ago
- Time of India
Heist with a sleight: Con man swipes $260K in diamonds; pleads guilty in Tiffany-Cartier theft case
After years of international crime, a 50-year-old Queens jewel thief has entered a guilty plea to stealing over $260,000 worth of diamond rings from Tiffany & Co. and Cartier, employing deception, sleight of hand, and fake jewelry. Yaorong Wan acknowledged stealing expensive goods from the upscale Fifth Avenue shops of the luxury merchants in March of last year during his appearance before the Manhattan Supreme Court on Monday. At Tiffany's flagship shop, Wan utilized distraction methods and a phony ring to switch out a $225,000 diamond ring. According to the New York Post, Wan visited the Tiffany store last year and asked about many pieces of jewelry, according to the prosecution. The DA claims that he left without buying anything after exchanging the real platinum-mounted ring for a cubic zirconia imitation. A little more than a week later, he hit Cartier once more while distracting workers and pocketing a $24,000 ring. Wan looked at two watches and two engagement rings at the Cartier store in Hudson Yards, but he pocketed one of the rings while the salesperson was preoccupied. According to authorities, Wan's methods—rapid, deft hand movements, deception, and the calculated use of imitation jewelry—are typical of the upscale thefts that brought him notorious fame throughout the world. Wan has a transcontinental criminal past. He has been connected to similar instances in New Jersey, California, Florida, and South Korea. Previously, Interpol wanted him in connection with a $330,000 diamond heist in South Korea. According to law enforcement officials, he committed robberies with the dexterity of a magician, targeting both smaller independent jewelers and international luxury names. Using a sleight-of-hand maneuver, Wan allegedly stole a Chopard watch worth over $17,000 from London Jewelers in the Manhasset neighborhood of Nassau County in April of last year. In 2018, Wan is also accused of stealing jewels valued at $332,000 in Seoul, the capital of South Korea. A fter a joint NYPD, Nassau County Police, and US Marshals investigation, Wan was taken into custody at his Flushing, Queens, residence in May of last year. Officers found other stolen items during the arrest, including the $17,000 Chopard watch that had been reported missing from the jewelry store on Long Island. Wan entered a guilty plea to second-degree grand larceny and was detained without bail because of pending warrants in other jurisdictions. He could spend three to nine years in New York State jail when he is sentenced on July 14, 2025. In a statement announcing the plea, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said, "This defendant stole hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of high-end jewelry using deceptive sleight-of-hand techniques." "We've stopped his worldwide theft operation because law enforcement agencies worked together."
NDTV
3 days ago
- NDTV
Jewel Thief Steals $260,000 In Diamonds From New York's Tiffany, Cartier
A notorious international jewel thief from Queens has pleaded guilty to a high-stakes theft spree targeting luxury jewellery stores, including Tiffany & Co and Cartier, where he swiped over $260,000 in diamond rings using sleight of hand and counterfeit gems, according to The New York Post. Yaorong Wan, 50, admitted in Manhattan Supreme Court to executing a pair of elaborate thefts in March 2024. At Tiffany's flagship Fifth Avenue store, Wan swapped a $225,000 diamond ring with a nearly identical fake using distraction tactics and misdirection. Just days later, he hit Cartier in Hudson Yards, pocketing a $24,000 ring while examining other high-end pieces and diverting staff attention. Authorities said Wan's techniques - rapid, precise hand movements paired with fake jewellery - reflect a pattern of sophisticated thefts that made him internationally infamous. He had previously been sought by Interpol for a $330,000 diamond theft in South Korea and has been linked to similar crimes in California, Florida, New Jersey, and abroad, as per the news report. Wan's criminal exploits extended to Long Island in April 2024, where he allegedly stole a $17,000 Chopard watch from London Jewellers in Nassau County using the same sleight-of-hand method. Following a multi-agency investigation, Wan was arrested in May 2024 at his Flushing, Queens home, where stolen items - including the Chopard watch - were recovered. He is being held without bail due to warrants in multiple jurisdictions, The Post reported. He pleaded guilty to second-degree grand larceny and faces a sentence of three to nine years in state prison at his July 14, 2025 hearing. 'This defendant used deceptive sleight-of-hand techniques to steal hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of high-end jewelry,' Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement announcing the plea. 'Thanks to the collaboration between law enforcement agencies, we've put an end to his global theft operation.'
Yomiuri Shimbun
3 days ago
- Business
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Chinese Association Accused of Mixing Crime and Patriotism as It Serves Beijing
In December, a man considered by U.S. officials to be among Asia's most powerful crime bosses gathered friends and allies in the Chinese casino city of Macao. Videos from the event show Wan Kuok Koi belting out Cantonese songs and smiling broadly for the cameras, seemingly unbothered by investigations across multiple countries into his alleged role in large-scale scams, fraud and money laundering. The 69-year-old Wan – widely known by his nickname, 'Broken Tooth' – presided over the celebration as chairman of the World Hongmen History and Culture Association, which describes itself as an ethnic Chinese fraternal organization devoted to promoting Chinese culture abroad. According to the U.S. Treasury, however, the association serves as a front for the 14K triad, one of China's largest organized crime groups with involvement in 'drug trafficking, illegal gambling, racketeering, human trafficking, and a range of other criminal activities.' In 2020, the Treasury imposed sanctions on Wan, the association and several related entities, saying they were part of a 'powerful business network' that had been involved in illicit activity across the Asia Pacific since 2018, and barred U.S. residents and entities from any transactions with them. A Washington Post investigation has found that the Hongmen association is not just an alleged criminal front. It is entwined with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in ways that have not been previously reported. And its network, which has continued to expand despite sanctions, has routinely supported Beijing's political objectives in Southeast Asia, the Pacific and Africa, even as it is investigated in at least four countries for alleged fraud, bribery, online scams, money laundering and other crimes. Wan's deputies, several of whose roles are being identified for the first time, have expanded Hongmen's footprint in the past five years largely unimpeded, The Post found, sometimes evading criminal charges by escaping to China and to jurisdictions where China has deep influence. The Post investigation drew on hundreds of photos and videos of Hongmen leaders, along with court records, police documents, business filings, and interviews with over four dozen government and law enforcement officials from seven countries, as well as Hongmen members, crime analysts and individuals close to the CCP. It discovered that at the same time the Hongmen association has been implicated in criminal activity, it has spread Chinese government propaganda, promoted unification with Taiwan, brokered projects for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) – China's $1 trillion infrastructure project to build global influence – and provided security for Chinese officials overseas as part of a stated mission to contribute to 'the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.' In virtually every country where it operates, Hongmen members have forged ties to elites that have been strategically helpful for China, diplomats and analysts say. And in at least one country, Uganda, Hongmen members set up a Chinese overseas police center – a type of facility that rights groups and U.S. officials say is part of Beijing's espionage operations. At the opening of the center in 2023, the Chinese ambassador, Zhang Lizhong, standing by the Hongmen chapter leader in Uganda, described it as an effort to 'protect the safety and legitimate rights and interests of Chinese investors and Chinese citizens.' Chinese leader Xi Jinping's bid to expand China's influence has made increasing use of Chinese people living and working abroad – a 'United Front' strategy that Xi has called the country's 'magic weapon.' This includes selectively exploiting ties to criminals that proclaim loyalty to the CCP, The Post found, letting them thrive as long as their illicit activities remain offshore and do not threaten domestic stability. A Chinese casino mogul, Zhao Wei, has been running a special economic zone in Southeast Asia that has become a flourishing hub of trafficking, money laundering and other illicit businesses, according to watchdog groups. Despite appeals to authorities in Beijing from organizations like the International Crisis Group to rein in his activity, Zhao has been able to travel freely to and from China and maintain close ties to Chinese officials, watchdog groups said. A representative of Zhao declined to make him available for comment. There is similarly 'extremely compelling' evidence tying the Hongmen association to Beijing, including photos of Wan receiving an award for patriotism from CCP entities, said Martin Thorley, a senior analyst focused on China at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC), a Geneva-based watchdog group. 'This is beyond clandestine diplomacy,' Thorley said. 'This is crime that is really deeply entrenched in state mac hinery An endorsement After the U.S. sanctions, online scam centers linked to Hongmen in Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos continued to expand, defrauding tens of thousands of victims with fake investment and marriage schemes, investigators say. The centers are increasingly steering away from targeting Chinese citizens to avoid Beijing's wrath, as they focus on people from other parts of the world, including the United States, according to U.S. and U.N. officials. The Hongmen network is under active investigation by law enforcement in Malaysia for alleged involvement in financial crimes, including fraud, bribery, stock manipulation and money laundering, and in an espionage case in the Philippines, according to officials who confirmed probes that have not been previously reported. At least two other nations – Thailand and Palau – had already opened investigations into Hongmen for allegedly running online gambling, scam centers and other illicit businesses within their territory. In Palau, a close U.S. partner, Wan was added in 2019 to the nation's 'undesirable alien' list and banned from the Pacific island country. That followed an attempt by Wan to secure land next to two U.S. radar sites on a main southern island, which raised concerns in Washington, officials in Palau said. But individuals linked to Wan 'remain active on the island and have continued to expand their influence in Palau and elsewhere in the Pacific,' the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said in an April report. In the past year, online-scamming, human-trafficking and money-laundering operations similar to those that Hongmen members have been accused of carrying out in Asia have also surfaced in Africa, with Uganda emerging as a major source for trafficking victims and South Africa growing as a hub for financial crime, investigators say. 'There have been increasing indications of major Asian criminal networks establishing connections and operations on the continent and exploiting similar vulnerabilities to those present in Southeast Asia,' UNODC said. Hongmen, in particular, has been 'increasing activity in Uganda and other African countries,' the office said. Ugandan and South African officials did not respond to requests for comment. 'There's a growing Venn diagram between [Chinese] authorities and Chinese organized crime groups overseas, where there's clear knowledge of each other's activities, a kind of co-awareness and cooperation,' said a former official in the U.S. State Department's Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs who, like some others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information or because of security concerns. The Chinese Foreign Ministry did not respond to a list of detailed questions. Neither did the Chinese embassies in Cambodia, Uganda and South Africa, countries where the Hongmen association has active chapters, The Post found. The Chinese Embassy in D.C. declined to comment. Messages, calls, emails and letters to over a dozen Hongmen-related businesses and organizations, including its registered corporations in Cambodia, were not answered. Responding to the U.S. sanctions in 2020, Wan said, 'The World Hongmen History and Culture Association has always abided by laws and regulations, and never under the guise of China's Belt and Road Initiative engaged in any illegal behavior.' Following the sanctions, Chinese authorities publicly distanced themselves from Wan, calling allegations that he had ties to the CCP 'lies' and 'unscrupulous attacks' on China. But an examination of public and visual records undercuts that assertion and shows that despite the well-known criminal associations of Wan, contact has continued between him, Hongmen, and state and provincial entities in China, including as recently as this year: – From 2015 to 2020, Wan identified himself and was identified in a newspaper owned by the Chinese government as a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), an advisory body for the party. Months after China's Foreign Ministry said in 2020 that he was not a CPPCC member, Wan was pictured at a ceremony in Beijing receiving an award for patriotism from the 'Overseas United Working Committee,' an entity that sits under the CPPCC and has ties to the People's Liberation Army. – Chinese state media has itself documented Wan's travels across Southeast Asia and the Pacific to negotiate government initiatives. In 2020, Wan met the president of Papua New Guinea alongside retired Chinese Senior Col. Li Yingming. Following the U.S. sanctions, Wan deepened his cooperation with a Chinese company, Ronghong Group, which works under a state-supported initiative to spread traditional Chinese medicine; he was listed last year as a consultant for the company. – Wan spent extended time last year in a special economic zone in Laos that Chinese authorities helped create to boost investment from China. In March, Wan met publicly with officials of China's southern province of Hainan to discuss cooperation with Hongmen – including joint work, with 'Laos as the base,' on the 'regionalization' of the Chinese yuan to displace the U.S. dollar, according to official statements. – On April 17, during an official state visit by Xi to Cambodia, Hongmen members there participated in a closed-door 'special discussion' on the security of overseas Chinese with Cambodia's deputy defense minister and an organization affiliated with the CCP, according to photos and statements from the association. The CCP makes 'precise, deliberate' decisions on whom it associates with, and Wan is 'arguably the most notorious criminal on the continent who has also been very publicly sanctioned by the U.S.,' said Thorley, the GI-TOC analyst. 'For them to have given him an award … it's as clear-cut as it gets,' Thorley added. 'It was an endorsement.' A network across the Global South Before he was a patriot, Wan was a kingpin. At the height of his influence in the 1990s, he had a $50 million stake at a Macao casino and command of 10,000 triad members, according to Portuguese prosecutors. (Macao was a Portuguese colony before it was returned to China in 1999.) Starting in late 1999, Wan served 14 years in a high-security prison in Macao for gambling, loan-sharking and attempted murder – a period in which the political landscape for Chinese organized crime changed significantly. The CCP moved to force triads out of China and, at the same time, began to co-opt non-state actors such as diaspora groups to further its goals overseas. Before his release in December 2012, Wan was contacted by Beijing's Liaison Office in Macao and persuaded to 'ensure peaceful coexistence between triad societies in Macao and to promote cross-straits links' between Taiwan and China, said Martin Purbrick, an expert in Chinese organized crime and former Hong Kong police officer who commissioned intelligence reports on Wan's activities at the time. The Hongmen association probably emerged from these discussions, Purbrick said. In 2018, months after Malaysia's then-Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad canceled or paused billions of dollars' worth of Chinese BRI projects, a Malaysian businessman closely affiliated with the Chinese Embassy, Tan Choon Hwa, helped Wan lead a group of Chinese investors to the capital, Kuala Lumpur, to meet legislators and cabinet officials, as well as Mahathir, according to Malaysian legislators and individuals close to the CCP. Photos and witness accounts also show that Wan's delegation included a Chinese chair of a CCP-linked entity, the Malaysia One Belt One Road Committee. Tan did not respond to queries on Wan. Mahathir said he did not recall meeting Wan. In 2019, Wan attended a commemoration of Macao's 'return to the motherland' alongside CCP leaders, and in 2020, during Hong Kong's pro-democracy protests, he filmed a video in support of the Beijing-backed National Security Law. As the world reeled from the covid-19 pandemic, Wan placed advertisements in Chinese-language newspapers in Malaysia applauding China's response. In 2023, Wan co-hosted an event in Macao to promote investment in Chinese traditional medicine – which the CCP has identified as a BRI priority – appearing alongside a former party leader from Tibet, photos from the event show. Unlike Chinese triads, which focused on controlling territory, the Hongmen association formed as a 'constellation of business structures,' which allowed it to expand rapidly across parts of the Global South hungry for investment, said Nathan Paul Southern, a researcher at the Eyewitness Project, an independent group investigating illicit industries. Business records show that an early business entity called the Shijie Hongmen Investment Co. was registered in Cambodia in 2018 under the name Xu Ran Ran, who was Wan's wife, according to law enforcement in Palau and Malaysia. Calls and messages to Xu's number were not answered. Other Hongmen companies and chapters were set up in at least eight other countries over a span of three years, public records show, as Wan brought old contacts and new allies into the organization, many of them Chinese nationals with criminal histories, according to public records reviewed by The Post. Of five Hongmen deputies identified by The Post, at least two have been convicted of various criminal offenses, records show. The association's first big initiative was a Hongmen-branded cryptocurrency, Hongbi, which was traded on a Hong Kong-based exchange. Documents published by All In Group, a Hong Kong company that partnered with Hongmen, listed a member of the All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese, an arm of the CCP, as a consultant for the project. Hongmen, pitch documents stated, would use blockchain technology to 'unite brothers' and facilitate Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative. After Hongbi's launch, however, the price surged and then plunged before the cryptocurrency was no longer traded at all, a pattern indicating 'a possibility of the crypto's use in a money laundering and/or so-called 'pump and dump' investor fraud scheme,' UNODC said in a 2024 report on financial crime that named Wan and Hongmen. Messages sent to a listed contact of the All In Group were not returned and the company appears defunct. Leong, a Hongmen member in Malaysia who asked to be identified only by his surname to avoid reprisals, said most buyers of the Hongbi coin ended up losing money. But the Hongmen association – and Wan specifically – came away richer, Leong said. Under investigation After Hongbi, Wan worked with contacts in Genting Highlands, Malaysia's casino hub, and with local groups to run online scams, manipulate stocks and carry out other schemes, the proceeds of which were funneled to Hongmen-related bank accounts, Malaysian investigators say. He also courted financiers in Malaysia for a Chinese development project in Myawaddy, Myanmar, that became a center for online scam centers and human trafficking, according to the U.S. Treasury and UNODC, and brought Chinese Malaysian criminal actors closer into the orbit of the CCP, say Hongmen members. 'Wan injected millions of dollars into the local casino industry and is believed to be a key player behind the proliferation of Myawaddy cyberfraud compounds,' UNODC said in a report on underground casinos. 'He is also understood to be involved in several related projects in Cambodia and elsewhere in Southeast Asia and the Pacific.' In 2021, Malaysian authorities charged Nicky Liow, a Hongmen vice president, with being a member of an organized crime group. But after a drawn-out legal process, Liow was acquitted without public announcement, court documents obtained by The Post show. Liow's lawyer, Rajpal Singh, did not respond to a list of detailed questions. Malaysian officials pointed to a lack of cooperation from Chinese authorities in the Liow investigation. 'It was a failure,' a senior police official in Kuala Lumpur said about the case. The problem for the prosecution, he explained, was that the nexus of power behind Liow's operations lay abroad, principally in China. When Beijing began clamping down on scam operations abroad that targeted Chinese citizens, Wan publicly denied ties to the Myanmar development, called Dongmei Zone, and to other scam hubs in Southeast Asia. 'It is all lies. I have never been involved in these heartless activities,' he said in a 2024 video shared on Hongmen channels. 'In the last years of my life, all I want to do is serve my country.' Last September, Malaysian police notified Chinese authorities that they were continuing their investigation to look more closely at Wan and his alleged involvement in fraud, bribery and money laundering in the country, according to people aware of the correspondence who described its contents to The Post. This came just as investigators in the neighboring Philippines opened a separate probe into Wan and Hongmen, in part for their connections to Alice Guo, a disgraced Philippine mayor currently in police custody on suspicion of spying for China and carrying out online scamming, money laundering, and other crimes at facilities in the country, said a senior Philippine official. A Malaysian academic who served until last year as a member of the China Overseas Friendship Association under the CCP said Chinese authorities tolerate Hongmen involvement in criminal activities in exchange for being able to rely on the group to carry out 'influence operations' in key countries. 'What the party wants is to unite groups like Hongmen and others in Thailand, in Cambodia, in Malaysia – unite them to serve the party agenda,' he said. Inroads into Africa As it comes under scrutiny in parts of Asia, Hongmen has turned to expanding its operations farther afield, in Africa. In March 2023, Thai police raided the Hongmen office in Bangkok in response to public videos of Bai Zhaohui, Hongmen's overseas president, boasting about illicit ventures in the country, and to tips that Bai was operating the Hongmen association without required permits. In the videos, since scrubbed from the internet but saved by Thai authorities and reviewed by The Post, Bai doesn't specify his activities but tells followers to do 'whatever business' makes him money, which Thai police said they believed referred to illicit activity. Court records in China show that a man matching the name, birth date and birth province of Bai was arrested at least six times and served a prison term from 2016 to 2020 for rape. By the time Thai authorities caught wind of his activities, however, Bai had slipped away. Two months after Thai police issued a warrant for his arrest on grounds that he was operating businesses and organizations without requisite permits, Bai surfaced in South Africa, where he registered a company called Huichuang Group in Cape Town, business records show. He returned to Beijing for a conference on Africa the following month and in 2024 appeared again in Beijing for a gala with CCP officials. Dressed in his signature white suit, he introduced himself to a television interviewer as chief executive of a firm with plans to provide security for Chinese businesses in Africa. 'Us Chinese abroad,' Bai said, 'have to take care of one another.' Surachate Hakparn, a former Thai police general who led the investigation into Bai, said his officers have communicated all they know about Bai and Hongmen to Beijing. 'The Chinese authorities have a lot of information,' Surachate said. The fate of the investigation, he added, was now up to them. Messages sent to various social media accounts that posted self-recorded videos and livestreams of Bai were not answered. Neither were inquiries sent to his company's address listed in business registration documents. In venturing into South Africa, Bai joined a growing Hongmen network that has ambitions to build influence on the continent. A glitzy opening The only authority able to rein in the association is the CCP, say Thorley and other researchers. Beijing in recent years has enforced a global crackdown on scammers targeting Chinese nationals, rescuing thousands of victims and hauling perpetrators back to China. The Hongmen network, however, has been left relatively untouched even as it continues to be involved in scamming operations in Southeast Asia that have targeted victims from across the world, including Americans, according to U.S. officials, U.N. investigators, and research organizations like the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Eyewitness Project. In Cambodia, at the same time the Chinese Embassy has repatriated Chinese criminals by the planeload, Hongmen has registered new businesses and opened retail storefronts, public records show. This is because Hongmen leaders, with their close ties to the Cambodian elite, have become key figures in China's relationship with the country, a staunch supporter on contentious issues such as the treatment of Muslim Uyghurs in China's Xinjiang region, say Western diplomats in Cambodia. Cambodia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to requests for comment. Hongmen held a glitzy opening last July for a retail store in Phnom Penh, which was attended by Cambodian politicians, generals and celebrities, photos and videos show. Hongmen documents and business registration records show that a Chinese national and association vice president, Cai Zhiqin, was last year named director of newly incorporated businesses in Cambodia to manufacture and distribute Hongmen-branded merchandise. Neither Cai nor his listed businesses responded to requests for comment. One recent afternoon, a Post reporter visited the Hongmen store, located in a Chinese enclave dotted with casinos and cryptocurrency exchanges. The store appeared to be more a projection of power than a functioning business. Inside a gleaming gold storefront monitored by guards, a video featuring Wan played on a loop. There were no other customers. An employee, who declined to give her name, said the store was a hub for the Hongmen association. Members come from all over Southeast Asia and beyond and hold meetings on the second floor, the employee said. What about all the merchandise on display? Was it for sale? The employee shook her head at the stacks of Hongmen-branded cigarettes, cigars, beer, whiskey, tea, water, watches and T-shirts. None of it was for sale. Smiling, the employee explained, 'It's just for show.'
