But it was. Not all indentured servants (or even most), were criminals, but many were. They didn't all go to Australia. And they weren't cut loose when the ship docked. The idea was your trip would be financed by your future labor. And they were running out of places to put the masses of poor criminals in places like London, that had staggering economic disparity. Keep in mind some of these crimes were for things like "being in debt". You might have been given a chance between a workhouse and a ticket to the new world + indentured servitude. A lot of people died in workhouses, they were not nice places. Hence why many were willing to risk being lost at sea, or having a shitty job for 10 years, because the alternative was even more bleak.