Police only have 56 officers fighting internet crimes involving children
Police only have 56 officers fighting internet crimes involving children
Police only have 56 officers fighting internet crimes involving children
By Rebekah Teo
KUALA LUMPUR – The Malaysian internet crime against children investigation unit (Micac) only has 56 officers despite being established more than five years ago, according to the police’s sexual, women and child investigation division (D11).
Assistant Commissioner Siti Kamsiah Hassan, who is also the Sexual, Women, and Child Investigations Division (D11) chief assistant director of Bukit Aman, said that although the Micac unit is small, it started the “ball rolling” in alignment with international and foreign law enforcement agencies in combating online sexual crimes against children.
She said that Micac was established for the purpose of early detection, to reduce the rise in other sexual crimes due to child pornography addiction.
“(Micac is also in) collaboration with multi-agencies in capacity building in order to enhance knowledge and skills – soft and technical skills through continuous learning, information-sharing, and investigation.
“(Micac also involves the) empowerment (of) the ‘target group’ (children). This is to enhance knowledge and skills through awareness campaigns, especially for children. (This is) also to increase self-control and resilience by enhancing spiritual value,” said Kamsiah at a town hall organised by Yayasan Chow Kit aimed at strengthening online safety for children.
She added that there is a shortage of resources and facilities due to the unit size, and that there are challenges concerning expertise since new skills and knowledge are essential in this field.
Meanwhile, Malaysia Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) community programme department head Hashimah Hashim said that “proactiveness is something everybody needs to do.”
She said that Section 263 (of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998) actually empowers all internet service providers to ensure that “work facilities are not abused” and that there will be no content threats or online harm, especially related to child sexual online offences using the Internet.
“They (internet service providers) are supposed to take down all this content. So, they have this right – they can do that. They don’t have to wait for MCMC to tell them ‘please take down’,” she said.
She said that through the joint efforts of MCMC, PDRM and Interpol, 408 sites related to paedophilia and child pornography were taken down from 2015 to October 2023.
She added that from January to November this year, 502 pornographic or content involving children exploitation has been taken down by social media platform providers.
Last year, it was reported that police had received notifications that 93,368 IP (internet protocol) addresses were suspected of sharing child pornography. However, the lack of trained staff led to only 103 of these addresses checked.
– November 28 2023
