Malaysia scored miserably in the international ranking on privacy for 2007 mainly due to the continued use of the Internal Security Act which allows for police search and seizure of evidence without a warrant, the installation of closed-circuit television (CCTV) and the use of biometrics to monitor immigrants in an environment where privacy laws and data protection do not exist.

In the International Privacy Ranking released on Dec 28 last year, Malaysia shared the last spot with China and Russia and categorised as ‘endemic surveillance societies’. This position (at an index of 1.3) is also shared with the Philippines, the US, Taiwan, Thailand and Singapore. Greece topped the European Union category as the best in privacy protection scoring 3.1 out of 5 (‘Adequate safeguards against abuse’), while Canada topped the international category with 2.9 (‘Some safeguards but weakened protections’).

Malaysia's poor record in privacy protection was said to be because of the absence of right to privacy in the constitution and other laws. Instead, there is interception authorised by the attorney general, the use of identification schemes (MyKad and the biometric) and the installation of CCTVs with no privacy safeguards. The report also said there is a ‘plan to implement a citizen data hub across government departments to keep information on individuals' backgrounds, education, and health records’.

There is generally very little appreciation for privacy and data protection in Malaysia, and individual information is easily available to the authorities and other parties. The MyKad has the capacity of holding personal details and banking information and private mobile numbers are easily obtained by sales people of any service or product without prior approval of the individual. Loan applicants are subject to a credit worthiness check supplied by a private company that could potentially blacklist individuals, also without their knowledge.

However, this situation contradicts the existing legal structures that promote secrecy in public decisions.

On the one hand, individual information is not protected and can be use virtually by anyone for any purpose, but the authorities protect public interest information such as development deals, concessionaire agreements and consultancy agreements secret under the Official Secrets Act.

The recent government announcement to install more CCTVs in private buildings to curb the rising crime rates in the country is a potential violation of privacy. There is no clear evidence to show the effectiveness of using CCTVs to reduce crime.

The CCTVs provide a perceived sense of security. Although we have seen that crime suspects have been caught on camera, the cases are still unresolved. On the other hand, just two years ago, a woman reporter lodged a complaint when she found out that an officer at a City Hall had used the CCTV to zoom in on her thighs. Is this the kinds of impact we want from the so-called monitoring?

We hope that the different parties, especially the government, will take this ranking seriously and take efforts to improve data protection and privacy for its citizens. This can start with the tabling of the Data Protection Bill after wide public consultation, as the bill has been on hold since 1998.

The rankings were jointly done by the US-based Electronic Privacy Information Center and the UK-based Privacy International since 1997. It surveys developments in 70 countries, assessing the state of surveillance and privacy protection. The report and other information can be accessed here .

The writer is executive director, Centre for Independent Journalism .