Six immigration officers were among 12 individuals arrested yesterday in an operation to dismantle a syndicate involved in hacking the Malaysian Immigration System to unlawfully process and approve Temporary Employment Visit Pass (PLKS) applications.
MACC chief commissioner Abd Halim Aman said those arrested from the Immigration Department included two from its information technology division, while the others nabbed were two company directors, three foreign nationals, and a police officer.
He said the suspects, in their 30s and 40s, were arrested between 2pm and 5pm at the MACC headquarters and the Immigration Department office in Penang in a joint operation by the two agencies.
“Preliminary investigations found that the syndicate exploited the 2011 PLKS quota without paying the levy required for the passes issued.
“A total of 1,306 fraudulent PLKS passes were issued, resulting in estimated losses of RM2.4 million to the government,” said Abd Halim in a statement today.
The MACC chief said searches were also carried out at company premises and Immigration Department offices in Penang and Putrajaya.
He said the operation followed intelligence-sharing between MACC’s and the Immigration Department’s intelligence divisions, with investigations conducted since May across the Klang Valley and Penang.
The operation was assisted by CyberSecurity Malaysia and Telekom Malaysia, he added.
All 12 suspects were brought before the Putrajaya Magistrate’s Court this morning for remand applications to facilitate investigations under Sections 17(a) and 16(a) of the MACC Act 2009.
- Bernama
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