KUALA LUMPUR, February 24 – The amendments to the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 [Act 588] officially take effect today following their gazettement on February 7. According to the Ministry of Communications, these revisions aim to enhance online safety, particularly for children and families, by introducing stricter penaltiesand clearer content regulations.
Offenders found guilty of online crimes involving minors now face a maximum five-year prison sentence, fines up to RM500,000, or both. Among key amendments, Section 211 has been revised to replace “offensive content” with “indecent content, etc.”, while penalties for content application service providers have been increased to RM1 million.
Minister of Communications Fahmi Fadzil emphasised that these changes will curb online exploitation, particularly in commercial misuse such as the sale of pornographic and paedophilic content. The ministry noted that online crime cases surged to 35,368 last year, leading to losses exceeding RM1.5 billion, making the implementation of these amendments both timely and necessary.
