IP: The Malaysian Crackdown --the truth

[Dave Farber <farber@cis.upenn.edu>]

>From a IPer  near the scene who requested anonymity djf


Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 08:38:45 +0800
To: Dave Farber <farber@cis.upenn.edu>
From:


The rumor itself is completely false. Although quite a few people
were triggered by the rumor and ran to the shops and bought
much foods I heard. 


There have been 3 people arrested who were charged to initiate
the rumor on Internet, and these became top story
on national papers. Details were not disclosed much, though.


There were concerns expressed about people's privacy since
the ISP cooperated with the police to crack down. 


The ISP issued a statement that they are not randomly scanning 
the e-mails of the customers, but with legitimate request from 
the law enforcement agency, it is legal here in Malaysia to help 
the police. They have to do that. 


Malaysia is now in a sensitive situation, politically and economically
and the government is getting very senstive.


The stock price drop is worst in Asia, much more than that of Indonesia
or Thailand, and the government's effort to borrow money from US by
raising special bond was not succesfull, yet they still need huge
amount of $$s to help get rid of bad loans in the banks, and they
do not want to go to IMF after seeing what's happening in Korea,
Thailand and Indonesia.


Ethnic tension here is not that high at all- unlike Indonesian Chinese
case, but the government tries to suppress it as much as possible
in its very early stage in order not to spread that later.