Domestic workers form the invisible backbone of Gulf households, yet many enter this sector under false pretenses and quickly find themselves trapped in conditions that meet international definitions of forced labor. While fraudulent recruitment is widely reported as a transnational crime, in the Gulf it functions as a systemic entry point into exploitation, especially for domestic workers whose jobs take place behind closed doors, where governments have consistently failed to protect the most vulnerable.
A landmark Amnesty International report documents the experiences of more than 70 Kenyan women recruited to work as domestic workers in Saudi Arabia who were deceived about the nature of their employment conditions. Many were promised professional roles or decent domestic work, only to be thrust into grueling servitude, working more than 16 hours a day without rest, pay, or freedom to leave. Once inside private homes, these women endured abusive treatment, had their passports and phones confiscated, and faced withheld wages, isolation, and systemic discrimination.
The core problem is structural, not accidental. In the Gulf, enforcement focuses on cracking down on deceptive recruitment agencies rather than addressing post-arrival exploitation, as domestic workers remain excluded from protections under Saudi labor law, so that their exploitation goes unchecked. Once in the private sphere of a household, oversight is minimal, leaving workers vulnerable to racism, abuse, and coercion. In this context, fraudulent recruitment is built into a system where it is both legally tolerated and socially normalized, creating a persistent cycle in which workers are deceived, trapped, and exploited.
Additionally, Gulf governments’ efforts to combat this exploitation have been largely inadequate. In early 2026, the UAE’s Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation shut down 230 social media accounts that were advertising domestic worker recruitment without licenses, many of them unverified and operating illegally. While social media has made fraudulent recruitment faster and more scalable, the problem runs deeper than online scams. Workers may be misled before departure, but upon arrival they are left completely isolated and have absolutely no effective channels for seeking protection or justice. Therefore, weak enforcement mechanisms and regulatory loopholes transform recruitment fraud into a pipeline of coercive labor conditions, with Gulf governments’ failure to strengthen labor laws playing a central role in perpetuating this exploitation.
To address this issue, Gulf states must go beyond shutting down fake social media accounts or imposing fines on deceptive recruitment agencies. They need to ensure that migrant domestic workers are equally protected under labour law regardless of employment type and that employers are held accountable for abuse under local legislation. Most importantly, an effective national inspection mechanism to tackle widespread abuse in private homes and monitor compliance should be introduced. Only then can recruitment cease to be a gateway to exploitation and begin to be part of a rights-based labour system that protects domestic workers when they face fraudulent recruitment.
