PUTRAJAYA: The government will roll out a regulatory sandbox from Jan 1 to assess child protection mechanisms and ensure consumer safety in the digital space ahead of full-scale enforcement.
Communications Minister Datuk Fahmi Fadzil (pic) said the initiative would involve the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and a number of identified social media platforms.
A sandbox is a regulatory testing framework commonly used in the technology and digital sectors, enabling stakeholders to trial new approaches, mechanisms or technologies in a controlled environment prior to full implementation.
This process allows regulators to assess a policy’s effectiveness, risks and impact while giving the industry room to adjust technical and operational capabilities to comply with legal requirements.
“Our approach isn’t about simply giving orders. We invite all platforms into a space known in the technology world as a ‘sandbox’, so government objectives align with the platforms’ capabilities and tools,” he said, Bernama reported.
According to Fahmi, the trial programme will run for several months to ensure that the measures put in place are effective and could not be easily manipulated, particularly to safeguard children from online risks.
Commenting on Australia’s decision to ban social media use for those under 16, Fahmi said Malaysia has no plans to adopt the same approach, but prefers the platform-proposed age verification mechanism as it is easier to implement and enforce while ensuring user privacy is protected.
Fahmi also said the sandbox implementation provides both the government and the platform with time and space to evaluate the mechanism’s effectiveness before rolling it out.
He stressed that while Malaysia is learning from other countries, including Australia and Denmark, its policy and implementation will be tailored to suit local context.
He added that the advancement of AI should not be viewed in isolation, but must go hand in hand with society’s capacity to assess information.
According to him, AI serves as a support system which can help provide early warnings, offer context and detect potential misinformation, but users must also be equipped with a strong level of digital literacy.
“As recipients of information, what kind of attitudes do we need to adopt to ensure we are able to distinguish between true and false information?” he said.
