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Lee Jong-seok, director of the National Intelligence Service (NIS), attends a full meeting of the National Assembly’s Intelligence Committee in Yeouido, Seoul, on October 22. / Source: Yonhap News

South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) said Tuesday it will increase personnel to collect intelligence and pursue the masterminds behind Cambodia-based scam operations that have drawn in thousands of Koreans.

Authorities estimate that as many as 2,000 South Koreans are involved in local scam rings, most as perpetrators rather than victims. President Lee Jae-myung has ordered the agency to “do whatever it takes” to root out transnational crime. The issue is expected to dominate the upcoming parliamentary audit of the NIS in early November.

According to the National Assembly’s Intelligence Committee, the agency briefed lawmakers on the scale of the scams and its response plan. The session, initially scheduled to approve witness lists for the November 4 audit, was expanded to include an urgent report due to the seriousness of the case.

The NIS said it has sharply increased its team in Cambodia and is enhancing cooperation with U.S., Japanese and Canadian intelligence agencies. It also plans to broaden joint operations with Cambodian authorities through existing drug-information networks. “We are expanding field operations to neighboring countries to hit the networks at their source,” the agency said, adding that it will track ringleaders’ funding lines and help establish a Korea–Cambodia joint task force.

The NIS also reported progress in investigating the death of a Korean university student in Cambodia in August, identifying the suspect as an accomplice of the ringleader behind Seoul’s 2023 Gangnam drug-ring case. A new response team has been dispatched to pursue the case under presidential orders.

Lawmakers are expected to question the agency during the November 4 audit about what concrete progress has been made since the president’s directive. “This is part of our ongoing mission, but we will mobilize additional capacity and focus,” an NIS official said.