Information, Communications and Culture Minister Rais Yatim today expressed dismay that the government's move to combat cyber crimes has received negative reactions.

NONE Commenting on a June 12 hacking threat following a government ban of 10 filesharing websites, Rais ( left in picture ) said the hackers "got the wrong end of the stick".

"They have misunderstood our good intentions. There is no cyber censorship in Malaysia unless crimes have been committed," he said.

The hackers, who call themselves Anonymous, have threatened to attack government websites from today in retaliation over the ban.

The 'hacktivists' had in an online posting threatened to attack the Malaysian government as it is "one of the world's worst (in terms of internet censorship)".

"It is unfair for them to just attack us. The goodwill of the world ought to prevail," Rais said.

Asked if the government will take action against Anonymous, he said: "If their identity is known."

Recently, 32 people claiming to be members of Anonymous were reportedly arrested for waging an attack on Turkish government websites for the same reason.

'No appeal to date'

Maintaining that the blocking of the 10 top filesharing websites is not censorship, Rais said the government "did not expect" the attack but is preparing for it nevertheless.

azlan "The measures (taken) are confidential (but) the Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and the Malaysian Administrative Modernisation and Management Planning Unit are taking the necessary action," he said.

Met on the sidelines of the the World Bloggers and Social Media Summit in Kuala Lumpur this morning, Rais also revealed that this is not the first time the government has faced such threats.

He reiterated that the websites blocked can appeal to MCMC if they feel they have been unjustly banned, but no appeal has been received to date.

Last week, the MCMC had announced that 10 websites including Pirate Bay and Megaupload have been blocked as they infringe copyright laws.

Users, however lament that companies pay such websites premium fees to send high resolution files like commissioned digital artwork electronically.

NONE In his opening speech at the summit earlier, Rais stressed on the importance of blogging responsibly.

"There are thousands of (bloggers) but how many have training in journalism and the ethics of good writing?

"What we need are good (bloggers), not symbols of attack on certain quarters."

The minister has been on the receiving end of cyber-attacks, including on microblogging site Twitter where he was the butt of the #yorais jokes.

He has  taken legal action against several bloggers who have linked him to a sexual crime, which he denies.

Gov't braces for cyber-attacks from Anonymous