Newly-appointed Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Seri Dr Salleh Said Keruak has instructed the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission to meet with Google, Facebook, and Twitter and ask them to block “false information and rumours” on their platforms.
Datuk Seri Dr Salleh said that Malaysia had outlawed the dissemination of false and unverified information, and that making them accessible to the public is also against the law. This essentially means that social media sites cannot allow users to post this kind of information.
While the MCMC has been instructed to meet with the internet companies, when the meetings are set to take place has not been revealed.
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Salleh has also said that these three social media platforms have been very cooperative when asked to remove offending content. Facebook alone complied with some 81 percent of MCMC requests. However, the number of requests made was not mentioned.
The government has been stepping up efforts to control the spread of misinformation on the internet; most recently with the blocking of the Sarawak Report website. Salleh has also made comments about amending the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 and the MCMC Act 1998; due because Putrajaya has failed to stop people from accessing content from blocked websites.
Most social media companies do not usually censor content automatically, and will only block content that violates their terms of use. These companies also publish transparency reports, which highlight the number of requests from governments to remove content. Google and Twitter are particularly aggressive about revealing government attempts to censor content.
[Source: Malay Mail Online]
