forced labour

Escaping Utopia is a 2024 TVNZ+ documentary series exposing the systemic abuse, forced labour, and clandestine escapes from New Zealand's Gloriavale Christian Community cult.

Human trafficking is one of the most underreported crimes in the world. These podcast episodes — selected by the truecrime.news editorial team based on relevance to trafficking, coercion, forced labour, and systemic exploitation — bring some of the most important cases to light.

On March 2, 1998, 10-year-old Natascha Kampusch was abducted in Vienna and held captive in a soundproof basement for over eight years. Her escape in 2006 and subsequent survival made her one of Europe's most remarkable resilience stories.

In 2024, a young man named Max was lured from the Philippines to a remote scam camp in Myanmar with promises of a high-paying casino job. Instead, he found himself trapped in a modern slavery operation run by international criminal syndicates. The Scam Factory podcast, hosted by Denise Chan, documents his ordeal and his sister Charlie's desperate efforts to secure his release.

Wondery's "Scam Factory" podcast, hosted by Denise Chan, investigates Southeast Asia's hidden fraud compounds where victims are trafficked, imprisoned, and forced to perpetrate global online scams under threat of violence.