The Official Secrets Act and Government Transparency

A meeting memo, an audit report, a Cabinet paper — in Malaysia, any of these can become a crime to share if it is stamped as an official secret. The law that draws that line is the Official Secrets Act 1972, and the absence of a federal freedom of information law makes it one of the most debated topics in Malaysian governance.

What does the Official Secrets Act 1972 protect?

The Official Secrets Act 1972 (Act 88) is the federal law that consolidates provisions for the protection of official secrets. According to the title of the official reprint of Act 88, it received assent on 26 September 1972 and came into force on 1 October 1972 (these dates still need to be verified against the reprint document). It has been amended, among others, through Act A573 (the Official Secrets (Amendment) Act 1984) and Act A660 (the Official Secrets (Amendment) Act 1986), which introduced, among other things, provisions relating to classification and certificates.

Section 2 defines an “official secret” as any document specified in the Schedule to the Act, together with any related information and material, as well as any other official document classified as “Top Secret”, “Secret”, “Confidential” or “Restricted”. The Schedule to the Act lists three categories of documents that automatically become official secrets:

• Cabinet documents, records of decisions and deliberations, including Cabinet committees;
• State Executive Council documents, records of decisions and deliberations, including its committees;
• Documents relating to national security, defence and international relations.

This broad definition means the Act’s protection is not limited to military secrets alone, but covers any document that has been classified in accordance with the prescribed procedure.

How are documents classified and declassified?

The power to classify rests in the hands of the executive. Under section 2B, a Minister, Menteri Besar or Chief Minister of a state may appoint any public officer by certificate to classify a document, information or material into one of four levels.

Element	Provision	Content
Classification level	Section 2	Top Secret, Secret, Confidential, Restricted
Power to appoint classifiers	Section 2B	Minister, Menteri Besar or Chief Minister appoints public officer
Power to declassify	Section 2C	Minister/responsible public officer may declassify at any time
Effect of certificate in court	Section 16A	Certificate is conclusive evidence and cannot be questioned

Section 2C allows declassification at any time by the Minister, the responsible public officer, the Menteri Besar, the Chief Minister or the head of state administration; once declassified, the document ceases to be an official secret.

The most discussed feature is section 16A. It provides that a certificate issued by the relevant Minister or officer confirming a document as an official secret “shall be conclusive evidence that the document, information or material is an official secret and cannot be questioned in any court on any ground”. In practice, once such a certificate is issued, the court does not reassess whether the classification was justified.

What are the penalties under the Act?

The Act provides for mandatory imprisonment with a minimum term for most offences, and does not offer the option of a fine alone for the principal offences.

Section	Offence	Penalty
Section 3	Spying	Imprisonment for life
Section 4	Making documents/measurements in a prohibited place	Imprisonment of not less than 1 year, not more than 14 years
Section 8	Wrongful communication of an official secret	Imprisonment of not less than 1 year, not more than 7 years

Section 8, the most frequently cited in relation to the disclosure of government documents, provides that a person who receives or communicates an official secret in contravention of the Act may be imprisoned for a term of not less than one year but not more than seven years, unless they prove that the communication was contrary to their will. This one-year minimum term means the imprisonment cannot be fully substituted with a fine.

Public debate over the scope of these penalties notably arose in early 2016. At that time, the Attorney General then in office, Tan Sri Mohamed Apandi Ali, was reported to have proposed strengthening the Act with heavier penalties — including proposals for life imprisonment and caning for journalists who refuse to reveal confidential sources. Such proposals, as reported, would require the approval of Parliament and royal assent before they could become law, and were not enacted in that form.

Why doesn’t Malaysia have a federal freedom of information law yet?

While the Official Secrets Act governs what may be kept secret, there is no federal law that grants the public a general right to request government information. As of the drafting of this piece, only two states have enacted their own freedom of information enactments.

State	Enactment	Key features
Selangor	2011 Enactment (gazetted 25 August 2011, in force 5 March 2013)	Right to request information within the jurisdiction of the state government
Penang	2010 Enactment (passed by the State Legislative Assembly 2011, assented by the Yang di-Pertua Negeri 9 January 2012)	Departments required to respond within 14 working days; an appeal board exists

These two states’ enactments are limited to information within the jurisdiction of their respective state governments, and do not cover federal departments or agencies. The Selangor enactment, although gazetted in 2011, only came into force on 5 March 2013; the Penang enactment is formally the Freedom of Information Enactment 2010, which was assented in early 2012. In Penang, the responsible department is required to respond to an information request within 14 working days, and an applicant whose request is rejected may appeal to an appeal board. Transparency advocates cite this state model as evidence that a framework for access to information can work, even if its scope is limited.

What is the Freedom of Information Bill 2026?

On 13 July 2026, the Freedom of Information Bill 2026 was tabled for its first reading in the Dewan Rakyat by the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law and Institutional Reform), Datuk Seri Azalina Othman Said. The government then tabled a motion to refer the bill to a Parliamentary Special Select Committee for more detailed scrutiny together with Members of Parliament and stakeholders. (The Standing Order number underlying that referral was not stated in the news reports cited and still needs to be verified against Hansard.)

The bill marks Malaysia’s first federal freedom of information framework. However, several civil society organisations — including the Centre for Independent Journalism (CIJ), ARTICLE 19 and the C4 Center — called for the bill to be withdrawn and revised. Among the concerns raised by ARTICLE 19:

• The bill retains the Official Secrets Act 1972, allowing information to continue being protected under existing secrecy law;
• The absence of a comprehensive “harm test” or a public interest override before information can be withheld;
• Access is limited to citizens aged 18 and above who must verify their identity and demonstrate a “legitimate and genuine interest”;
• Criminal liability for using information for a purpose different from the original request;
• The proposed Ombudsman has no jurisdiction over information protected by the Official Secrets Act.

What are the differing views on this balance?

This topic involves competing considerations between national security and transparency, and stakeholders hold differing views.

Those who support retaining the Act emphasise that the protection of official secrets is necessary for national security, defence, international relations and the confidentiality of Cabinet deliberations — the categories specifically named in the Schedule to the Act. From this perspective, the conclusive certificate under section 16A provides certainty and prevents court proceedings from exposing sensitive information during a dispute over its classification.

Conversely, transparency advocates and some media organisations argue that the broad definition of “official secret”, combined with the conclusive certificate of section 16A and mandatory minimum imprisonment, has the effect of limiting reporting and public oversight. They put forward the Selangor and Penang enactments as examples of an alternative model that permits access to information with certain exemptions.

This piece presents both positions descriptively; it does not take a stance on whether the Act should be retained, amended or repealed.

What comes next?

Watch the progress of the Freedom of Information Bill 2026 through the Parliamentary Special Select Committee and its subsequent readings, as its final text and the scope of its exemptions will determine its relationship with the Official Secrets Act 1972. For legal reference, the full text of Act 88 can be reviewed on the official portal of the Attorney General’s Chambers. This piece is an AI draft that has not been reviewed by a human and requires editorial review before publication.