OVER 65,000 scam and illegal online gambling content remain online despite takedown requests by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), Communications Minister Datuk Seri Fahmi Fadzil said today.
He said the figure was part of more than one million takedown requests submitted to online platforms between Jan 1, 2025 and Aug 31 this year.
Of these, 935,416 pieces of content were removed, representing a 93 per cent compliance rate among the platforms.
The removals included 592,695 pieces of gambling-related content and more than 227,486 related to scams.
“However, 65,280 pieces of content were not removed following MCMC requests.
“That figure is important because although the compliance rate is relatively high, tens of thousands of potentially harmful pieces of content remain accessible to users,” he said in his speech at M360 ASEAN at the Grand Hyatt Kuala Lumpur today.
On the online sale of drugs, Fahmi said authorities faced challenges in detecting prohibited products because sellers often used terms that did not directly refer to the actual name or nature of the products.
“Sometimes the way a prohibited item is displayed on their platform may not use certain words. So they try to play around with terminology.
“For example, in the issue of illegal drug sales, fentanyl for use in vapes. Sometimes they use different words, but users may recognise them and be able to purchase them,” he said.
Fahmi said sellers also avoided using scientific names or explicitly stating that the products being offered were drugs.
He said the issue had been detected most frequently on one particular platform, although monitoring would continue to ensure prohibited goods, including drugs, were not sold through e-commerce platforms.
He said the operator of the platform had been called for discussions on Monday, although he had yet to receive a briefing on the outcome.
“Malaysia’s position is firm. We will not budge. They need to be more proactive, not merely remove (content),” he said. - September 10, 2026
.jpeg)
