IN OCTOBER 2023, ecologist Izereen Mukri received a phone call and a photo about a “weird monkey” in the urban park near his house called Taman Subang Ria in Selangor.
Izereen glanced at the photo. Greyish black with a long tail – it was a Selangor silvery langur, Trachypithecus selangorensis, a primate species classified as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List. These langurs live in mangroves or by rivers, not in a park surrounded by roads and buildings.
He went to observe the langur. It was a female that must have felt terribly alone as the species naturally lives in a group. It was not eating its natural diet of shoots, but the apples and bananas left by park visitors. It was also relaxed when humans got close. Izereen, who spoke to Macaranga in his personal capacity, suspects that it used to be someone’s pet.
(Feature image: The lone female Selangor silvery langur found lingering in an urban park in Subang Jaya, Selangor. “It was a beautiful shot. But I rather not have it,” said wildlife photographer Izereen Mukri of this January 2024 photo. | Photo by Izereen Mukri)
Izereen reported the sighting to PERHILITAN, Peninsular Malaysia’s wildlife law enforcement agency. They said they had failed to translocate the langur.
The langur’s behaviours and Malaysia’s growing problem with online wildlife trade suggest to Izereen that that the langur is a victim of illegal online trade.
Malaysia is one of the top 7 countries where one can easily buy a live primate online. All native primate species are either protected or totally protected in the country and require government approvals to be traded or kept. But primates are still actively traded as pets in Malaysia because of inadequate laws, enforcement, and public awareness. Most owners, sellers, and poachers go unpunished.
PERHILITAN told Macaranga that illegal online wildlife trade happens via social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram and TikTok), and instant messaging apps (Whatsapp, Telegram and WeChat). They have received 111–201 complaints yearly of such sales since 2020.
Social media is wild
In his office in the Kuala Lumpur city centre, Amirul Nazri Wan Nawawi was typing in the Facebook search bar: “B-E-R-U-K”.
Immediately, an auto-finish suggestion popped up. “Beruk untuk dijual (monkey for sale)”. “See!” said Amirul, “Popular now. What the hell.”
Amirul used to own a pair of Southern pig-tailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina). He recalled buying them in 2016 through Facebook and WeChat. He had seen Facebook posts of people keeping them as pets.
“I thought you could just keep it, just like that. I wasn’t aware that it’s illegal. I wasn’t aware that it was an endangered species.” He learned this only after a neighbour lodged a complaint against him.
PERHILITAN urged the public to get accurate information about the criteria and licences required to keep wildlife. As per the Wildlife Conservation Act, anyone keeping protected species without a licence would be fined not more than RM50,000 or jailed not more than 3 years, or both. If the animal is immature, as Amirul’s were, the penalty would be at least RM20,000 or jail of up to 7 years, or both.
Mending a loophole
But the Wildlife Conservation Act only persecutes the unauthorised keeping of wildlife, not online trading. This is a loophole exploited by online sellers who might not even handle the animals. Rather, another party would send animals to the buyers. And PERHILITAN has been struggling to nab these people handling the animals as the online trading gives no hint of the physical exchange.
To fix this loophole, the Wildlife Conservation Act was amended in 2022. Lawmakers added a section (88b) that makes it illegal to promote the sale of protected wildlife without a trading licence, including online. If convicted, unlicensed online traders can be fined RM50,000–RM100,000 or jailed up to 5 years, or both.
But section 88b has not been gazetted into law. The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability told Macaranga that this section has to wait for another relevant section’s amendment to be gazetted first. They did not elaborate on the reason for the stall.
Tackle it the techie way
Social media companies are trying to do something about the wildlife crimes committed on their platforms.
In 2018, tech companies and NGOs formed the Coalition to End Wildlife Trafficking Online. Meta Platforms Inc, who owns Facebook, and Tencent, who owns WeChat, are members.
The coalition says that its 47 member companies “blocked or removed more than 11.6 million listings for prohibited wildlife online from March 2018 to September 2021”.
Conservationists and analysts are sceptical about the Coalition. They question if its membership has allowed greenwashing, and they demand transparency about the content moderation process.
But for Kanitha Krishnasamy, Director of TRAFFIC Southeast Asia, removing posts does help to eliminate opportunistic sellers. The serious illegal traders that remain would then be “priority [targets] for law enforcement intervention and for investigations,” said Kanitha.
House rules
Mariani Ramli, who has been rehabilitating ex-pet gibbons since 2013, suggested the platforms conduct more research and set up a special team to monitor wildlife trade, just as one would monitor drugs.
At the moment, the community standards or guidelines of Facebook and Instagram – both owned by Meta – prohibit sales of endangered species. But how strictly they are enforced is unclear.
Macaranga reached out to Meta’s Corporate Communications and public policy lead for Malaysia and Singapore but received no response.
Malaysia’s multimedia and communications industry also has a code of conduct for content dissemination called the Content Code. The code, drawn up by the Communications and Multimedia Content Forum of Malaysia, says that “if something is illegal ‘offline’, it shall also be illegal ‘online’.” And since trading wildlife without a PERHILITAN licence is illegal offline, it would also be illegal on social media platforms.
The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) told Macaranga that the Content Code “encourages a responsible approach in content control and self-regulation by certain parties or individuals.”
Compliance with the Content Code is, however, not mandatory for social media operators and users.
Need more successful prosecution
The government recognises that collaboration is crucial to combat wildlife crimes online. Malaysia’s National Policy on Biological Diversity 2022-2030 aims to “work with online and social media platforms, telecommunications service providers, and relevant agencies, to adopt a ‘zero tolerance’ policy against the online sale of wildlife and to detect criminals involved in such activities.”
Nik Nazmi bin Nik Ahmad, the Minister of Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability (NRES), told Macaranga that his ministry works with MCMC because neither wants “our cyber world in Malaysia to be a hub for crime”.
As for Meta, whose Facebook is so widely used by local online traders, Nik Nazmi said NRES was only dealing with them via MCMC and the police. But it is “worth exploring for us to directly engage them and to see how they can take a more proactive role, rather than wait for us to enforce. If they have the algorithm to detect that you are selling something illegal and they can disallow you to upload it.”
In a separate statement to Macaranga, PERHILITAN said they have long been collaborating with social media platform providers, e-commerce companies and telecommunication companies, especially in sharing wildlife cybercrime information.
The government’s approach for collaborative investigations is “absolutely spot-on”, says Kanitha, but success would depend on how it is prioritised by various agencies, particularly the ones that have never handled wildlife crime matters. And agencies would need enough “time, money and human resources to be able to help with investigations.”
On resources, Nik Nazmi said NRES does have to “keep on lobbying the government for that.” He conceded that it is challenging to compete for resources against education and health. “Wildlife trade is something that people don’t really realise [is important].”
In addition, Nik Nazmi sees the need for successful prosecution with the maximum penalties. “If say, a parent bought [an illegal wildlife pet] for a kid and the maximum penalty is fifty thousand [ringgit], so be it. And we should send that message,” said Nik Nazmi. “At the end of the day what really works is just getting [out] examples of people being caught and punished.”
To prevent spillover?
But Izereen thinks that all wildlife pet trade must stop, not just illegal trade. He argues that keeping any wildlife could fuel illegal trade as people compete to own the rarer pets. “Why don’t you stop [it] altogether?”
Nik Nazmi said the ministry is now stricter in licensing wildlife for private collection. But to go for zero wildlife pets, the ministry would have to revisit granted licences. “It’s a bit more challenging, because that will involve changing what has been approved,” said Nik Nazmi.
Let them stay wild and free
For Amirul, he attempted to get a licence to keep his macaques after realising that he needed one. He sent his macaques to stay temporarily with a friend in Hulu Terengganu where there was a tree they could call home. They seemed to enjoy that.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Amirul did not bring his macaques back to the Klang Valley. He then started to realise he could not give his pets the environment they deserve. He was also warned by a veterinarian to castrate the male macaque before it grew aggressive.
Wanting what was best for the macaques, he paid someone to care for them in a forested area. Two years later, he released them into a forest. He has not seen or heard of them since.
“Having a tree makes them very happy already. Imagine having lots of trees,” said Amirul. He covered his eyes with his fingers and sobbed. “I really regret bringing them into my life.”
Meanwhile, in Subang, the langur continues to roam alone, its fate hanging in limbo. PERHILITAN told Izereen that if conflict arises between the langur and humans, they would have to kill it.
PERHILITAN urges public members to report any wildlife crime to PERHILITAN’s HOTLINE at 1800-88-5151 or through e-aduan on www.wildlife.gov.my. In addition, social media users can report posts or profiles selling illegal wildlife to the platforms for removal.
This story follows from wildlife trade media training organised in 2023 by the US Agency for Global Media which Macaranga co-led.
[Edited by YH Law]
- Nijman, V. et al. 2023. Global online trade in primates for pets Environmental Development 48.
- SMACC Spotlight Report. 2022. Wild animal "pets" on social media: A vicious cycle of suffering.
- Moorhouse, T. P., D'Cruze, N. C., & Macdonald, D. W. (2021). Information About Zoonotic Disease Risks Reduces Desire to Own Exotic Pets Among Global Consumers. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution 9: 609547.
- Warwick, C., & Steedman, C. (2021). Exotic pet trading and keeping: Proposing a model government consultation and advisory protocol. Journal of Veterinary Behavior 43: 66-76.
- Krishnasamy, K., Stoner, S. 2016. Trading faces: A rapid assessment on the use of Facebook to trade wildlife in Peninsular Malaysia.
The story idea on wildlife cybercrime came after rounds of discussions between Hannan Azmir and Kwai Han since September 2023. “Reptiles”, “wildlife”, “pet” and “online” were the few keywords that drove our research.
Kwai Han visited a pet shop, temples (for their turtle ponds), and spent an evening observing visitors and the animals displayed at the exotic pets section of a pet expo. When an ex-pet macaque was shot dead in Penang’s popular hiking spot, she followed and learned its story from primatologists and locals.
She scoured Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Roblox. Two nights were spent learning to play Adopt Me!, a popular virtual pet caring and trading game on Roblox. Kwai Han also read research papers on how wildlife’s portrayal on popular media affects people’s attitude about them.
To understand the efforts done to curb the issue, she studied Malaysia’s wildlife laws, the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998, and the Content Code. She also looked up the European Union’s Digital Services Act and what Meta is doing about it there.
Kwai Han spoke with more than 15 sources, including conservationists, researchers, primatologists, wildlife photographers, a lawyer and an ex-primate pet owner. Only a few were named in the story, but all have helped shaped the story.
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