con

The former engineer had been trying to sell his family's timeshares in Tenerife and was alerted to the con by the police.

The magician Ricky Jay’s compendium of actual “unique, eccentric and amazing entertainers” offers a parade of con artists, charlatans, escapologists, daredevils, mesmerists, contortionists and sideshow acts.

Behind the con, investigators say, is a black market connecting foreign criminal networks to server farms that blast scam texts to victims.

Experts say most of the centres, notorious for their romance scams and "pig butchering" investment cons, are run by Chinese-led crime syndicates working with Myanmar militias in the lawless badlands of the Golden Triangle.

"There's pros and cons to every single thing that's about in life," he said.