The MPD initiative involves only aggregated statistics from mobile operators, with no collection of personal data or individual user information, says Deputy Communications Minister Teo Nie Ching.
MOBILE network operators only submit aggregated statistical outputs to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission under the Mobile Phone Data initiative.
Deputy Communications Minister Teo Nie Ching stressed that all raw data remains entirely within the telecommunications companies’ own systems.
She provided examples showing the data would indicate “the number of mobile broadband subscriptions in the Bangi parliamentary constituency” rather than any individual user’s location or identity.
For tourism analysis, the initiative produces statistics such as visitor numbers and domestic tourism trips without tracking individuals.
Teo was responding to Syahredzan Johan’s question about mobile phone data collection and user privacy rights during the Special Chamber session in the Dewan Rakyat.
She emphasised that the MPD initiative is not a surveillance system and involves no collection or transfer of users’ raw data.
The initiative does not involve any Personally Identifiable Information and therefore falls outside the Personal Data Protection Act 2010’s definition of personal data.
Teo explained that mobile operators initially had two implementation options for processing data.
Under Option A, operators processed data within their own secure environments before submitting aggregated statistics to MCMC.
Option B allowed operators without internal processing capabilities to submit de-identified data to MCMC for aggregation.
By the end of the first quarter this year, all mobile network operators had fully migrated to Option A.
This means no de-identified data is collected anymore under the MPD initiative.
